Before moving on to the fifth season of Computer Chronicles, let’s return to the earliest days of the program to discuss an episode that had been lost until recently. There are several episodes still missing from the Internet Archive’s repository. Thankfully, one was recently located and digitized by the Stanford University library.

This first-season episode from March 1984 focused on software utilities. Herbert Lechner of SRI International joined Stewart Cheifet as co-host. (Gary Kildall was on a business trip to Japan.) Cheifet noted that many people who used computers didn’t know much about utilities. Was there an easy way to define what a “utility” was? Lechner said it was one of those terms that had not been precisely defined. Most people would agree that utility programs were those that helped you perform routine housekeeping functions that would otherwise occupy a lot of the user’s time and energy.