By the time laptop form factor became somewhat common, yes, it was spreadsheets, word processing, and a communication suite (mail, file transfer, etc). Those w

By the time laptop form factor became somewhat common, yes, it was spreadsheets, word processing, and a communication suite (mail, file transfer, etc). Those were the critical features that fueled laptops for several years, taking money from people who found a reason to work on the go. It was a considerable jump up from super tiny (but still used!) computers like Epson HX-20 or super heavy (luggables). The people using them for spreadsheets and word processing joined the field engineering and military applications. Hell, laptops stopped being synonymous with "business executive" in popular vernacular only after 2000s.