Much has been said about the genius of Steve Jobs, who revolutionized technology through his design, marketing and creation of personal computers and mobile devices. But the thing that I am most thankful for is the user friendly operating system.

This was my first computer in 1985. I worked in the composing room of a  newspaper publishing company. At first we used the Apple computer to do production schedules and other internal documents, but soon we used it for classified and display ads. Different than other computers on the the market the apple had a graphical user interface (GUI) and used square pixels instead of rectangular ones, making it far easier to accurately map graphics to the screen making it the obvious choice for graphic design studios and publishing companies.

With no previous computer experience and never taken a business course or even a typing class but with this computer I was able to point and click my way to full pagination earning a promotion to production manager  and I was in love with my Mac. Over the next few years typesetting machines, production cameras, dark rooms, chemical processors were replaced with scanners, lazer printers and Macs. Desktop Publishing was born.

Here’s to you Steve Jobs. Thank you for your beautiful, usable computers.  As the shock at his premature loss has given way to a celebration of his life it’s been amazing to read all of the personal anecdotes of those lucky enough to have known him.

Here’s a rare 1996 interview with Steve Jobs on Wall $treet Week with Louis Rukeyser

Awesome works of art tributes to Steve Jobs

And finally: A Quote from Steve Jobs

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

Do something great.