In 1979 the Apple II was the only game in town for truly personal computers. Eventually, others (notably, IBM) tried to steal Apple�s thunder with their own PCs, so Apple had to fight back. Revolution in the Valley is the story of how Apple Computer made a machine better then the best and changed the face of computers forever.

Told from an insider�s perspective by Andy Hertzfeld, a key member of the original Macintosh team, Revolutions reads like a blog written at the time the events unfolded. A collection of specific events in the development of the Mac. Each short story (1-5 pages) relates an event that is memorable or significant to Andy. Other members of the Mac team periodically comment on Andy�s recollections.

The book has almost 90 stories arranged pseudo-chronologically. Part One goes from August 1979 to February 1981 and tells how Andy started at Apple and moved to the Mac Development team. Part Two covers from February 1981 to September 1982 when he�s helping Steve Jobs find a replacement for Bud Tribble, the original Mac Software Engineer. Part Three jumps back to April 1982, and goes on to September 1983 discussing reasons behind some classic Mac ideas. Part Four Picks up in September 1983 and ends in January 1984 with the announcement of the Macintosh to the world. Part Five concludes with Andy�s leave of absence in March 1984 to September 1984 when Andy quit Apple and ends with Steve Jobs leaving the company in May 1985.

The stories in the book originally appeared at folklore.org/, a website developed by Andy for the purpose of collective storytelling. Folklore.org is meant to chronicle any number of significant events, but to get the ball rolling, Andy started posting anecdotes about the development of the Macintosh, which became the basis for this book. The site allows viewers to comment on stories and even add their own and eventually other members of the Macintosh development team started to contribute.

Here's a taste of some of the interesting things you'll discover in this book. Jef Raskin, who orginally concieved of the Mac, argued against the inclusion of a mouse. The Mac team had to secretly acquire the Sony 3.5" floppy drive without Steve Jobs' knowledge, going so far as to hide a Sony executive in a broom closet to avoid detection..

Based on the nature of the stories there is a bit of redundancy in the book. The stories are meant to be read by themselves, but when they're collected together you're reminded of things over and over again. I feel like I read the introductory sentence "I began working on the Mac project in February 1981" at least five or six times in one chapter. In context, it makes perfect sense and lends to each story it introduces, but in book format it's kind of odd to see it repeatedly. Clearly, this book is a collection of stories and not one story divided into chapters..

The book also gets pretty technical at times, but never more so than in the story, "Mea Culpa," where Andy apologizes for mistakes he felt he made along the way. I mean, I understand that Andy feels bad for putting "the bits controlling the 'locked' and 'purgable' attributes in the high-order bits of the master pointer," I just don't understand what that means. One reason the book gets technical sometimes may be that Andy didn't set out to write a book. He's just reminissing about the good old days of making the Mac.

By the same token, including all the technical information and private moments serve another purpose. By writing for people who were there, it makes you feel like YOU were there. Like you're one of the people in the book. The core audience for this book is the rest of the Mac team and they all get it, so writing for them makes you feel like you get it (even when you don't). Like you're part of the team. After reading this book you'll want to send the whole Mac team a card that says "Thinking of you. Keep in touch." That's why I keep saying "Andy" throughout this review and not "the author." After reading the book I feel like I know him, like we both stuggled to make the Mac happen.

Summary
If all you're interested in is the facts and you don't mind scrolling a lot, you can go to folklore.org and read the Macintosh story there. You'll also find images that aren't in the book and comments and responses to each story. I found Andy's recollection greatly enhanced online when other participants responded with their own memories or even their corrections. But none of those are good enough reasons not to buy the book. There something to be said for be able to hold a book. To turn pages as the story evolves.

Also, the book is beautiful. It includes pictures you've never seen before and is designed to be very readable. Some design elements I liked: an important quote may take up an entire page; stories by other contributors are set in a different font to make it clear you're not reading Andy's words; and the special design "easter egg" when you take the dust jacket off the book, but I'll leave that for you to discover on your own.

Revolution in the Valley is a beautiful book that I recommend to anyone who wants to read a first hand account of the journey that is the reward.

Reviewer: Marc Robinson. MLMUG Journal Editor-in-chief, and Columnist, iEditor Marc spends his spare time as a costumed crimefighter protecting the innocent in the never-ending battle against evil.

Addendum:
Sally Bazrod put a link on the listserv to a Newsweek article by Steven Levy. That article links to www.pacifict.com/story/, which is the story of the dedicated programmers who wrote Apple's Graphing Calculator. The story is a great read and a perfect fit with Andy's book, so I thought I'd tell you about it. Check it out.

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© 2005 by Marc Robinson & MLMUG
Posted 1/5/05
Updated 1/7/05