Everyone stop for a minute and go read "The Door Into Summer" by Robert A Heinlein, published 1957. Skim over the vaguely squicky but not abusive romantic part. Take the time travel as a necessary plot device.

The sections about inventing "Drafting Dan" are essentially an obsolete (even then) trained engineer trying to describe computer-aided drafting without ever having seen it. Or the transistors then microchips then less-than-room-sized computers then graphic user interfaces that turned out to be necessary for CAD in the real world. In, I repeat, 1957.

Dan's second invention, the "Hired Girl" housecleaning robot, basically describes this press release in the same can't-quite-see-the-future terms. Heinlein also has some remarkably shrewd suspicions about the programming problems of dealing with, say, putting away any set of dishes in any kitchen with a generalized set of instructions.

Is it just me, or are any other fans of old SF noticing this aspect too?