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To computer buffs, this vast selection represents the fulfillment of the computer age's promise. Says Ernest Baxter, managing editor of Personal Software magazine: "Put the right kind of software into a computer, and it will do whatever you want it to. There may be limits on what you can do with the machines themselves, but there are no limits on what you can do with software."
Despite the multiplying uses, software is sometimes forbidding to the novice computer operator. Instructions can be so complicated that they require hours of study and practice before the programs can be operated with ease. Says Alfred Glossbrenner, author of How to Buy Software: "If there is any single factor that could kill off the computer boom, it is the lack of complete, easily understood instructions."
Martin Dean, 43, president of Select Information Systems of Kentfield, Calif., has drawn up a consumer's bill of rights to combat hard-to-use software. "The only conclusion I can draw from the way some software packages operate," he argues, "is that their designers really think that you will be happy spending nights and weekends figuring out how to make the products work."
Even the instruction manuals provided to help users over the difficult first steps can range from barely acceptable to awful. Such bestselling programs as WordStar, for writing and editing, and dBase II, which helps organize business records, originally had terrible manuals, although the manufacturers have just issued improved instructions. Some software, including both WordStar and dBase II, now contains tutorial discs that show novices how to use the programs in a simple, step-by-step fashion.
Some of the idiosyncrasies of software can be traced to the people who create it. Writing software is often a solitary occupation, especially for specialized programs with limited markets. A programmer can frequently spend 18 hours a day at a terminal working on a difficult problem. That fanaticism allows very little time for ordinary human pursuits; programmers often wryly characterize themselves as "computer nerds."
A few are as reclusive as Garbo or J.D. Salinger. Paul Lutus, 38, lived in a cabin high on Oregon's Eight Dollar Mountain when he wrote Apple Writer, an early word-processing program. Lutus, the author of several other bestsellers, was forced to rig up a 1,200-ft. extension cord in order to get enough power for his Apple computer.
The earliest application programs were developed by personal-computer hobbyists and were freely traded much as housewives swap favorite recipes. The authors were often more interested in displaying their work than in earning money from the programs. Copies were readily made and duplicates given away at computer-club meetings. As recently as 1980, software was still — something of a cottage industry, with programs packaged in plastic bags and sold through the mail.
Independent programmers operate much like authors, selling their software to publishers in return for a percentage of the sales.
About 50 of these freelance programmers