Essential Guide to Computing: The Story of Information Technology, The

Chapter 13. Client/Server Concepts

Much of this book is focused on the changes that are occurring as our society moves toward "pervasive computing." This chapter will depart from that for a moment to reflect on developments in the traditional corporate environment, where the desktop machine remains the center of attention. There is still radical change here as well. Viewed from the perspective of the user at the desktop, computing has gone through a number of distinct generations before reaching today's stage of sophisticated networking. There is considerable irony in this story because the original desktops, terminals, were all connected to each other in a network provided by a mainframe. Computing then "progressed" to independent desktops ...