For a few years—back in the early ‘80s—I fell prey to information automation fascination. I managed an IT department transitioning from a basic accounting system managed by an external service bureau to a batch inventory-control system to an order-processing and manufacturing-control system running on a succession of minicomputers with names like Dec 1170 and HP3000.

If you recognize the names of these systems, or if you are familiar with RPG, assembler, Cobol or FORTRAN, then you, too, may be an old lean dude. The hardware of that decade was slow, flimsy, and subject to frequent crashes; the term “user friendly” as applied to the interface had not yet been invented.

 …