Timeflash

Starting in 1959 Douglas Engelbart launched the SRI Augmentation Research Center to pioneer the modern interactive working environment. NLS (On Line System) was built during the mid-1960's to develop and experiment with software and hardware tools that would make people more productive using computers. NLS was an exploratory vehicle for research into the "knowledge worker/organization." Among the original ideas developed and implemented in NLS were the first hypertext system, outline processor, and video conferencing. In 1964 he had developed the "mouse," to be followed by the development of two-dimensional editing, the concept of windows, cross-file editing, uniform command syntax, remote procedure-call protocol, mixed text-graphic files, structured document files, idea processing, and many more developments. Like the work of almost any pioneer Engelbart's work was not recognized immediately, the mouse waiting until the development of the personal computer, fifteen years later, to find its niche. Engelbart received the IEEE Computer Society Pioneer Award in 1992.

By the mid-1960's the jet airliner (and Boeing) had revolutionized the airline travel business but the reservation process, even though there were elemental reservation systems, was inadequate. In a period when remote access had been proven by the CTSS system, IBM produced the first large scale, on-line, real-time reservation tracking system, named SABRE for American Airlines, and soon to be copied by others.

To many the world of computing changed radically on April 7, 1964 when IBM announced System/360, the first IBM family of compatible machines. While there was at least one other compatible family in GE, the commitment to an upwards compatible family and the merging of the scientific and business lines of machines by IBM had a profound effect on the way many businesses thought about computers.(1)