>>They actually were able to accomplish useful things but it was about as stable as a newspaper in a windstorm.
Depends what you're comparing to- the prevailing norm at the time or what we expect today. ;-)
Some of those FP2.x apps still are used. I'm very sure I recognized the teal and blue FPD popup menus at the checkout of a building wholesaler last week.
"... They ne'er cared for us
yet: suffer us to famish, and their store-houses
crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to
support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act
established against the rich, and provide more
piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain
the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and
there's all the love they bear us."
-- Shakespeare: Coriolanus, Act 1, scene 1
