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The First Journal on Software for Personal Computers

1/1976
Reprint version of the first issue of Dr. Dobb's journal from the Collected Volume published in 1976

Reprint version of the first issue of Dr. Dobb's journal from the Collected Volume published in 1977.

In January 1976 the first issue of Dr. Dobbs' Journal of Tiny Basic Calisthenics and Orthodontia was first published by Dennis Allison and Bob Albrecht of the non-profit The People's Computer Company, associated with the Portola Institute on Menlo Park, California. It included the peculiar computing/orthodontic subtitle, "Running Light without Overbyte." Dobb's was a contraction of Dennis and Bob. Because memory was initally very expensive, compact coding was important, and microcomputer hobbyists needed to avoid using too many bytes of memory — avoiding overbyte.

The journal began as a "short-term mimeographed forum for the newly written Tiny Basic language." Intially Allison and Albrecht planned on three issues. However, finding a ready market, the informally produced magazine for programmers went into steady publication, with editorship assumed by Jim C. Warren as of the second issue in February 1976. Ten issues appeared in 1976. As the years passed, the journal morphed through various forms of publication, including the slick-looking Dr. Dobb's Journal circa the year 2000. In June 2014 when I revised this entry it was a website for programmers, drdobbs.com.  

The publishers viewed Dr. Dobbs more as a reference series than a throw-away periodical. Thus they kept back issues in print. In 1977 the first year was reprinted in book form with an introduction by Jim Warren.

 

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