produce-code database

At long last, mighty Weggers has computerized its giant produce-code database; the produce-codes the entire industry uses.
“Hello,” I said. “I see they have finally computerized the produce-code database.”
“They sure have,” the checkout-girl said; “and it makes my job a lot easier.”
“I could never read that thing,” she said, pointing to the 11X14 printout of produce-codes.
Of course not. It was a giant white sheet of 10-14 columns, with fonts so tiny (about 4-8 points) you needed a magnifying-glass, to get it all on one sheet.
Every stall has a ‘pyooter-screen; your order appears on the screen, over a blue background, as each item is scanned.
Well hello. If you got a ‘pyooter-screen, you’re already halfway there. Why a printout?
“I bet that printout was a ‘pyooter-file too.”
“Yep; I bet it was.”
“It’s the old wazoo. If it’s in a ‘pyooter, you can get it on the screen.”
The database displays as 4-5 pages, six columns each, on a red background, each item a 20-point font. Much easier to read than the printout.
One time the checkout entered a peach as a potato. “That ain’t no potato.” I said.

Reminds of wars at the mighty Mezz concerning honor-rolls.
Years ago the HRs were sent as faxes, which a typist would retype. Then “Boss-Man” discovered I could scan, so I started scanning the HR faxes. Nice, but the scanner could misread the fax, meaning I had to proof the output.
“I bet these honor-rolls are done in a ‘pyooter,” I said, “so why can’t they just e-mail me their file, and then I don’t have to proof........”
“Yeah, why not?” Boss-Man said. And thus began the giant war to get the school-districts to e-mail their honor-rolls.
It took moving heaven-and-earth. Apparently they had faxed stuff for eons — e-mailing meant dragging the school-secretaries, kicking-and-screaming, into the ‘pyooter-age.
Canandaigua School District, with its giant honor-rolls, was impossible. Promises-promises. The head school-guy promised e-mail but we got a fax.
“This is utterly impossible,” I said. “I thought we were supposed to get e-mail.”
Boss-Man called the head school-guy and delivered the third degree: “We can’t do this; somebody will have to retype it.”
Head school-guy had to kick all his secretaries in the butt.
Finally all the honor-rolls were e-mailed — Canandaigua being the biggest challenge, since it was so huge.
With my antique Word I could fiddle the e-mails and turn out a ready-to-print HR in an hour-or-two.
E-mail was nice, but each school-district had its own way of doing things. Most were a spreadsheet with names, each last-name-first or first-name-first. I had to get spreadsheets into paragraphs with first-name-first, but I could do that boom-zoom with Word-tricks. Same with name-order.
Now that I’m gone, the mighty Mezz was on its own, and no other staff could do Word-tricks like me.
So the mighty Mezz sent out a letter to each school-district detailing the exact format the HRs had to be in — printable. (I.e. now the school had to do the Word-tricks.)
So much for that. The mighty Mezz hardly runs HRs at all: only those that come printable; perhaps two out of 10.