Before these sessions are over, I shall probably hear at least one of the following questions: Why should I use the computer? What can I use the computer for? I shall probably not hear the question: How does the computer work? There are both good and real reasons to avoid the question of how a computer functions. As archivists our primary concern is the preservation of records and their orderly description. How can machines help us in our continuing struggle against backlog, mass, diversity of record, and diversity of record conditions? I sometimes think we almost enjoy our private professional dilemmas. Like the calluses on a farmer's hand, our burdens of backlog, mass, and diversity are symbols of our professional brotherhood. If we are really professionals, however, we are seldom stymied by burdens. As archivists we are determined to produce a distinguished archives. We are determined to keep backlog from stagnating, mass from swallowing us in our archival little acre, and diversity from burying the pure wealth of our record groups in a tundra of trivia. We are concerned with records preservation. How much intellectual control we can gain through machines or our own in-depth content analysis is totally dependent on maintaining physical control. There is another real reason why we do not often ask how the computer works. Someone is likely to tell us! He will discuss hardware in exotic terms when we have always thought of it as faucet washers and toggle bolts. He will tell us about software, system flows, interfaces, confrontations, sense switches, loads, bits, and bytes. With every word he will isolate us from the comfort of our own archival jargon like retention, disposal, chron files, record series, record groups, provenance, and respect des fonds.