You can come to our basement to see the TRS 80. It’s only here for sentimental reasons. It used floppy discs…and we still have those too! It was quite the fancy machine when we got it almost 45 years ago!
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Tandy was part of Radio Shack. Not quite sure of the business relationship between the two companies, but you went to RS for the tandy computer. TRS probably stands for tandy radio shack.
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Tandy Radio Shack…ours was bought there.
Which sort of makes me think how sad we were when radio shack closed. Seemed like we were there all the time for something.
I also fondly remember our first printer…a dot matrix thing that the paper seemed to always jam in.
Fun fact…when I started at my main school district in 1981, they had all Commodore computers…they were on the cutting edge. 
I talked them into buying me an Apple IIE because it had more educational software. For a couple of years, I was the only one with an Apple computer. The school refused to do anything with it…so my DH did everything I needed to have done (there was no internet). Then the school district switched entirely to Apple computers…maybe IMacs? Then they switched eventually to Dell, and Chromebooks. But my last thing I did the year before I retired was convince them to start using IPads…again because of the availability of educational applications.
I remember asking my husband if we should get a commodore computer to replace the TRS 80…and he said he wouldn’t have that Commodore junk in the house!
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I was once able to program in Fortran and COBOL. I feel ancient admitting that.
A favorite retro technology marvel was when our department got a Wang word processor. It was a game changer.
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That was actually a Final Jeopardy question last fall in the category USA: “When area codes were introduced 3 very populous areas got the ones quickest to dial: these 3 codes.”
It was a triple stumper for the contestants, but I did know it.
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My first job in high school was punching Fortran cards for summer students at the Big Ten university in town; my mom got me the job.
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Definitely an upgrade from the green-screen CRTs (cathode ray tubes) we used to create files with embedded formatting codes to send out for typesetting. Remember the term WYSIWYG (“whizzy-wig”)? I was an expert on the Fortune Systems version of the Wang, and it’s how I got my start in tech (tech writer/editor). Eventually, I became more interested in the tool than the trade and became a Bell Labs/Sun Microsystems-certified Unix instructor, course developer, sys admin, etc.
Though I cringe to admit this, we had a DECwriter — in our bedroom. 
At the time, it was the equivalent of DH’s current iPad addiction. I often said I needed a nightshirt with a keyboard printed on the front…
Hayes modem (remember the term “baud rate?”)
Timex Sinclair. We had one of those, too.
Wow that wang word prices are has gotten 2 mentions here! The woman who had one in my college town tried to type my dissertation but had no clue how to follow the APA required formatting so gave up.
Here’s how the IBM selectric ball typewriter worked. Google Search
Wow! That’s impressive
I decided to check just now if my daughter knows what a floppy disk is…
Ok, cool. Learned about it on Instagram. I guess it’s not all just puppy videos out there 
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Does anyone remember the old ditto machines?
I have vivid memories of helping my mom who taught middle school when I was done with elementary school. This would have been in the early 70s.
The purple was ink had a nice sweet smell. And stained your clothes.
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OK, true story: My company provided computer systems training and support to Ford Motor Company. Shortly after those 3.5” hard disks came out, our hardware team got a call about a “broken” disk drive. When the tech went over to the client site to see what the problem was, he discovered that the user had FOLDED a 5.25” floppy disk so it would “fit” into the new 3.5” drive. And couldn’t get it out. Even with a letter opener. Imagine that.
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Absolutely, but I think we referred to them as “mimeograph” machines.
ETA: I looked it up as I don’t remember the term “ditto” machine. Mimeograph also uses purple ink but via a different mechanism.
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As a reward in school we’d get to use the ditto machine.
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What does one do with a ditto machine?
It may copies. Would run off multiple copies of handouts, tests, wrenn. Hence, I guess, maybe, the name “ditto”.
I will bed my socks my DH has every one of these items around this house somewhere:
You make copies. So in school one could use a template and make worksheets.
Now I’m curious. For those who called it a mimeograph, were the copies called mimeos? Or dittos?
I’ve been there!
We had a coupler when I was in high school, but I didn’t take the computer programming course. When I took it in college there was a giant room that held the mainframe and we had to reserve time on terminals to hook up to it. I had a bunch of comp sci friends and one of them made his own computer from a tape deck and parts and raved about this contraption called a mouse that he’d met one summer on an internship. Meanwhile we played Asteroids and Advent on the Arpanet…
Mimeos were purple and a bit fuzzy. I think dittos were black and better quality.
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