Early scheduling software

Older scheduling software was not bad. It was just very confident. It liked clean appointment lengths, clean recurrence choices, and users who did not answer three phone lines at once.

Feature	Practical note
Local database files	Easy to back up if someone remembered which folder mattered.
Workstation-only calendars	Fine until the one computer with the schedule was in use.
Recurrence dialogs	Powerful, but not always clear about one changed occurrence versus the whole series.
Fixed appointment durations	Fast to enter, annoying when the actual visit length varied.
Print layouts	The daily printout was often better than the screen for front desk work.
Date-format settings	Small setting, large confusion when two machines disagreed.

Backups

Disk backups were only comforting if someone had tested a restore. A printed daily list still mattered because it was the schedule you could hold when the computer was sulking.