- Apple’s first product was the Apple-1 computer, introduced in 1976. This early microcomputer used an unusual type of storage for its display: shift register memory. Instead of storing data in RAM (random-access memory), it was stored in a 1024-position shift register. You put a bit into the shift register and 1024 clock cycles later, the bit pops out the other end. Since a shift-register memory didn’t require addressing circuitry, it could be manufactured more cheaply than a random-access memory chip.1 The downside, of course, is that you had to use bits as they became available, rather than access arbitrary memory locations. The behavior of shift-register memory was a good match for video circuitry, though, since characters are displayed on the screen in a fixed, repeating order (left to right and top to bottom).
- Centipede (video game) (Wikipedia)
Centipede is a 1981 fixed shooter arcade video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. Designed by Dona Bailey and Ed Logg, it was one of the most commercially successful games from the golden age of arcade video games and one of the first with a significant female player base. The primary objective is to shoot all the segments of a centipede that winds down the playing field. An arcade sequel, Millipede, followed in 1982.