Owain gurgled happily, sounding much like
they were saying:

Erm. What did you write your dissertation with? Word?

Bit further back than that. Can't remember what the word processor was
called on the Atari ST - but, yes, my final year project did focus on
the ergonomics of word processor user interfaces, as it happens. A
lucky guess on your part, I suspect. Congratulations.

I remember 1st Word Plus on the Atari (used it in 1st year undergrad).
IIRC it had the endearing habit of, when renumbering footnotes meant
footnote 10 became footnote 9, leaving a superfluous space in front of
the 9.

Before that I used WordStar at college and then at uni I had to write my
essays in vecce on the VAX before I bought my Atari. I can remember my
excitement at getting a computer with half a megabyte of memory when the
VAXen only had 4 or 6.

And I had a printer - Star LC-10. *That* was the luxury, there were
quite a few BBC Micros on the corridor in hall, but not many people had
printers.

God, yes - I had an LC-10, too. I remember the HP Deskjet 500 coming out
- major lust object, an INKJET! And so cheap! Only £500...

And pricing up a PC - oooh, I could almost stretch to a 386SX, if I
specced it up carefully - only about £1500.

Mind you, the first computer we had at home was a Sinclair, of course.
Not a Speccy. Not even a ZX81. A ZX80... Then a Sharp MZ-80K. Think
they're still in my mother's loft somewhere.