Hewlett-Packard has published a well-written article by Steven Vaughan-Nichols called The History of the Floppy Disk.  Vaughan-Nichols goes all the way back to the format’s invention by IBM engineer David L. Noble, who was assigned by Alan Shugart to develop, “a reliable and inexpensive system for loading microcode into the IBM System/370 mainframes using a process called Initial Control Program Load (ICPL).”  This project led to the invention of the 8” floppy disk.  Vaughan-Nichols follows the evolution of the format to the present day, and along the way credits the Apple II with making the floppy disk a success.

Read the whole article here.

Volume 15, Issue 2 (June 2010) of Juiced.GS, the longest-running Apple II publication in print, shipped today to all subscribers. This issue features a review of the FC5025 floppy controller; a tutorial for using the Super-Mon programming utility; an opinion piece on the growing divide between users and programmers of Apple products; and the second in a five-part series on transferring files between the Apple II and other computers.

This is Juiced.GS‘s second quarterly issue of 2010. Annual subscriptions are available for $19 for United States customers and $26 for international customers.