3 ms·

Common among engineers but not the general public.

• skissane 6y ago
  The term was common in computer magazines in the 1980s and 1990s. A lot of people who read those were not IT professionals, they were popular with enthusiasts. Many of them were sold in mainstream outlets targeting the general public.
  • fuzzfactor 6y ago
    As we have seen, they didn't hit their target often enough for it to make much difference back then. Most offices didn't have an enthusiast yet, and certainly not IT professionals. I even took a look at a personal computer publication or two at the time, and I am neither. Publications needed to cast a wider net, but it took a while to reel ordinary users in. _App_ was literally understood by enthusiasts for years without ever becoming part of the everyday spoken vocabulary even among themselves. It still had no meaning to users at the time, but they already knew what a program was, as well as a computer programmer. However, most users purchasing their first Apple or PC had never yet heard of a software engineer. Kind of helps to explain why it took until the 21st century for the nomenclature to become mainstream.
• nineteen999 6y ago
  "Applications" was one of the default program groups in Windows 3.1: https://i.redd.it/e8zxsf8ax1v11.png https://i.redd.it/e8zxsf8ax1v11.png