I was tempted to write "computers were so slow and lacking in resources that you were forced to write efficient code". Because efficient code is good, right?
But I lived through that era and being forced to write efficient code is a god-damn nightmare. There were so many ideas flying around that you simply couldn't do because the computing power just didn't exist.
Today people revere things like "vi" but when you were forced to use such basic utilities because your human/machine interface was a 300 baud modem, or even a paper teletype, life wasn't so good.
But I lived through that era and being forced to write efficient code is a god-damn nightmare. There were so many ideas flying around that you simply couldn't do because the computing power just didn't exist.
Today people revere things like "vi" but when you were forced to use such basic utilities because your human/machine interface was a 300 baud modem, or even a paper teletype, life wasn't so good.
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.