P.S. The statement is radically wrong, not at all "a pretty reasonable fairly non-technical reduction for the average New Yorker reader" -- a large fraction of whom have either used a command line or written code of some sort, and know that these are two different things. Even if using a line editor like old ed, one is not entering code at the command-line prompt, and in any case the code does not go "directly to the machine" (long ago I actually did load code directly into the machine via console switches). And consider that the context here is discussion of a text editor! But some people seem compelled to defend and rationalize any statement that is challenged, no matter how valid the challenge or absurd and intellectually dishonest the rationalization--it's some sort of bizarre white-knighting.