I’m an old guy, but I love technology. While many of my peers had trouble trying to send an email, I was light years ahead.
One of the most useful things I learned at school was touch typing. By the time I completed grade 10, I could type at 60 words per minute using any type of mechanical typewriter and produce a range of documents. Learning to type has helped me in every job ever since.
I first came across technology when I joined the RAAF in 1965. Then, we had ticker-tape machines, or more appropriately titled Telex machines. We’d type a message that appeared as dots on a narrow, long piece of paper tape and when finished, stick the tape in the machine, link it to the phone line and press a button. The Telex tape would chatter away sending the message faster than I could type. It produced an original and a carbon copy simultaneously.
If that wasn’t impressive enough, by the time I got to attend university in 1982 (as a mature age student), I discovered the early Apple II computer and a word processing program called Zardax. It didn’t take me long to use the university’s computers and printers to produce my assignments, all of which were printed within minutes looking crisp and professional.
My fellow students were paying people to produce their assignments while I churned mine out in no time. The ability to cut and paste, embolden, italicise, and create the compulsory footnotes automatically won me over and my life changed forever.
I later became a Queensland (Australia) Technical and Further Education teacher teaching within the business and computing discipline. I taught typing using mechanical and electronic typewriters and word processors, desktop publishing, spreadsheets, databases, and programming among other things. I loved the technology, I loved the students and I enjoyed teaching it.
There was so much one could achieve using whizz-bang technology and well thought out software programming. As a teacher, and later a head of department and training manager, it made my life much easier and more productive.
Ever since I’ve loved technology and have a great respect for those behind designing it. Although I resisted buying a SMART phone for a few years, I have adapted well to my iPhone and all the excellent apps that are available.
Now, I can book a doctor’s visit on an app and even have a CASIO Edifice watch that checks its timing accuracy using an iPhone app every morning at 7 o’clock.
How good is that?