A true anecdote of early Apple Human Interface design pains

For context, this anecdote describes a particularly important and surprisingly difficult design challenge, and what happens when the designers’ solution to it meets real users.

This is in regard to the 1982 computer program “Apple Presents … Apple” [1], provided by Apple so that computer stores could demonstrate the then-impressive features of the Apple //e computer. Notably, the computer could be connected to monitors that were black and white, green screen, amber screen, or full color. For the demonstration program to work properly, it had to know the capabilities of the monitor that was being used. And the only way it had to learn about the monitor was to ask the user in front of the computer.

The design challenge relates to how tricky this question-and-answer problem actually was.

[1] https://archive.org/details/ApplePresentsApple1982

Anecdote begins on page 16.