The Making of the MCM/70 - Inventing the PC - page 43

In his work on the rack prototype as well as on the produc-
tion model of the computer, Laraya was assisted by a number
of people: André Arpin, Reg Rea, Tom Moffatt, John Wallace,
and others. Most architectural decisions, such as memory man-
agement, were taken in consultation with the software engin-
eering team led by Ramer.
On 11 November 1972, the prototype was demonstrated dur-
ing a special general meeting of the shareholders of Kutt Sys-
tems in Kingston, Ontario. During that meeting a motion was
passed to change the name of the company to Micro Computer
Machines ( MCM ). And finally, a name was chosen for the KSI
computer: the MCM /70.
The rack prototype of the MCM /70 was soon followed by its
more refined portable version. It was put on show in a special
demo session during the Fifth International APL Users' Confer-
ence, which took place in Toronto in May 1973. “I remember
that we had the fiberglass model there,” said Laraya. “It was
heating up.” Ramer, too, remembered the event vividly: “The
demo had to be interspersed with short talks to allow José
[Laraya] to exchange the heat-sensitive parts and then restart
the system for the next segment of the demo.”
The demonstrated prototype already had the appearance of a
remarkable computing gadget. It was small and portable. It had
a built-in keyboard and a unique plasma display, and was run-
ning APL . Of course, with limited RAM and no external stor-
age, that prototype was nothing but an advanced APL -based
scientific calculator. However, although rudimentary, it did
attract the attention of the APL community and made it evi-
dent that high-level programming languages such as APL would
soon be readily available on small desktop machines.
The demonstration in Toronto was well attended but reac-
tions varied. Some conference participants were clearly more
impressed with IBM - which selected the conference venue to
announce APL . SV , its long-awaited successor to the APL \360