Computer History

This is a completely biased list of the things in computer history I’m interested in: personal computers, Smalltalk, Apple, and the World Wide Web.

Books

Covering Major Topics

• Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution
• Dealers of Lightning: Xerox PARC and the Dawn of the Computer Age
• Insanely Great: The Life and Times of Macintosh, the Computer that Changed Everything
• Steve Jobs in Exile - about NeXT, significant as NeXTSTEP was and is the basis of Mac OS X and iOS
• Apple: The Inside Story of Intrigue, Egomania, and Business Blunders
• Console Wars: Sega, Nintendo, and the Battle That Defined a Generation

Niche

• Defying Gravity: The Making of Newton
• Grateful Geek: 50 Years of Apple and Other Tech Adventures - by Jean-Louis Gassée of Apple and Be
• High Noon: The Inside Story of Scott McNealy and the Rise of Sun Microsystems - including Java
• learn different: Designing Multimedia at Apple 1987-1992
• The Secret History of Mac Gaming
• Shareware Heroes

Video

Recordings

• The Mother of All Demos, Douglas Engelbart

Documentaries

• Before Macintosh: The Apple Lisa
• Love Notes to Newton
• Project Code Rush: The Beginnings of Netscape
• Springboard: The Secret History of the First Real Smartphone

Interviews

• Adele Goldberg - PARC and Smalltalk
• Avie Tevanian - Mach microkernel, NeXTSTEP, and Mac OS X
• Larry Tesler - parts 1, 2, 3 - UX researcher, PARC, Apple Advanced Technology Group