Steve Jobs tribute

Our first computer was a Mac.  A 256k square little Macintosh that had been boosted to 512k.  The second was our own home built Mac - the guts of a Mac Plus SE in an Intel case. (Somewhat treasonous I know, but I was at least running a Mac OS!).

For a long time we were at sea with various 2nd hand PCs (the story ends happily with our current workstation - a powerful Intel Mac Pro wih more RAM than necessary) but during those early years, Apple provided a then computer newbie the resources from which to build a lifetime's career in IT.  

Along with the early Mac came a compiler - Borland's Turbo Pascal version 1.1 (it was lightening fast; but never made it to 1.2!), and a pile of source code.  It was possible to buy a series of Inside Mac (1..7) operating manuals and build neat applications that conformed to the Mac's strict Application Development guidelines.  Over endless hours we read through the source code listings and taught ourselves the disciplines of writing quality code. But behind these efforts, and the efforts of thousands like us, was Steve Jobs - a beacon who stood not only for brilliant innovation, but for quality and integrity in software and computer hardware engineering. 

We loved Apple's products, and in our own way, loved the man that had created them.  Steve Jobs was always more than a man, he was the computer user's friend; a true leader and a symbol for all that was good about software and computing generally.  His products inspired an almost emotional connection - far from the love hate experiences with the dominant Wintel platform.  And through his return to Apple Inc. to repair the damage that Sculley and corporatisation had done, we were all reminded of his genius and breathed a collective sigh of relief to know that Apple would go on to become what it had always promised.

There will be many pundits for the man from quarters far more appropriate to assess his contribution than ours. I just wanted to say a belated "thanks Steve" from all of us who've learnt from, grown from, and fallen in love with your products.

Rest in peace.