Allen’s personal comments

Minimum technology you really need

Pen/pencil and paper

Almost all of the world’s great literature started on plain paper with pen or pencil. If you’ve got those, you are good to go.

Don’t rough draft on your phone

The modern cell phone is a powerful little computer, but it has several drawbacks as a device for writing college essays—all related to the “little” part. Students today have incredibly adept thumbs, so perhaps typing 1500 words accurately on that tiny screen isn’t a problem, but you just cannot see much of your paper. In the vertical position (“portrait”), you can see either an incredibly tiny page or about six lines, but only the left half of each. In the horizontal position (“landscape”), you can see the whole line, but only three or four of them. You never get to see a whole page of your work—only tiny chunks. If you feel you absolutely must write everything on your phone, figure out how to print your rough draft and do your editing on paper copies.

Why didn’t I list computers?

And why didn’t I have a list of high-end requirements?

Elsewhere, the university has given us a very demanding, detailed list of what you must buy, but for our English class you do not have to do any of that.

Nearly everyone showed up here with some sort of computer, and almost any working computer can do what you need for this English class. Nearly every computer built since 1995 can put out documents in docx or odt format, so if you can type on it, you can use it for Ashland papers. We have public computers at several locations around campus; if you don’t have a good one (or yours is not operating), you can still do your work.

A lot of students feel they must rush out and buy the most expensive computer they can find, but the truth is that the least expensive Apple, Windows, or Chromebook will do everything you need—at least until you get into courses that require making high-end computer graphics.

BONUS THOUGHTS:

• We don’t like to say it, but theft is a problem on any campus, even Ashland. I found a $10,000 gaming laptop online, but it won’t do any better at writing papers than a $350 computer. The expensive computer will, however, be more attractive to dishonest people.
• Student computers live hard lives, and it’s a lot less painful to break a $350 computer than a $10,000 one.
• In the “hard lives” department, if you bought yours recently, you should really consider one of those extended care policies (AppleCare, Geek Squad Laptop Protection or something similar).

Some honesty about word processing programs

I’ve been a “power user” since about 1982, so I have a few strong opinions about computer software:

• The best word processing program is the one that you feel comfortable using and does the work without fouling up.
• Once you save a file in docx format, I cannot tell how you made it—and I truly do not care.
• Software companies would love to suck a lot of money from us end users. I don’t want to give them that money.
• Software companies also love the idea of cloud-based software so they can change the program from their end and hold all your files. Even ignoring the privacy issues (that’s a lot to ignore), this strategy causes trouble if your Internet connection is poor. Your ability to work depends upon the health of someone else’s equipment—MS Word 365 is always very slow, and at least twice in the last year, Microsoft simply went dead for a full day.

I have written a longer discussion of word processing software (complete with instructions). Follow this link to read it.

You need something that can get email from Microsoft Outlook

All University email comes through Outlook, so you need to be able to get to it. Most cell phones can download Outlook apps, and anything that can get to the Internet can open our Microsoft 365 Copilot site. (If you don’t have either a phone or a working computer, you need to visit an AU public computer frequently to check your mail.)

The views and opinions expressed in this page are strictly those of the page author.

The contents of this page have not been reviewed or approved by Ashland University.

Revised 6/27/25 • Page author: Curtis Allen • e-mail: callen@ashland.edu.