Contact breakers, remember them? It appears that many of the younger mechanics coming through don't really know what points and condensers are. Maybe they don't teach them the basics of ignition systems in college anymore, maybe they take no notice because they've never had to fit any. Probably the latter.
To get a spark to fire across the spark plug's air gap, we need a pretty high voltage (20,000 - 30,000 volts), for which we use a coil. Everyone's familiar with those, but just how do you get a spark out of one? Without electronic jiggery-pokery CDI and transistorised ignition systems?