If you want to be pushing the envelope, you're supposed to have daring, young and dynamic engineers on your team. We work in a quite different manner. There is actually none younger than the magic 38.5 on our team (I'm the chicken). But it's not all gloom and doom, there is still a lot to learn from these old guns, who claim that software was already invented before Java was born in the early 1990s. They like to ask tricky questions, such as "Why are computers booting?"* or "Why do we have to deal with endians"**.
Whatever, one of my senior colleagues has brought me an article*** on Heron of Alexandria. This Greek engineer stored programs on pegged cylinders to control the scenery shift of theatrical performances. Heron lived in the first century. I reckon even he relied on the work of predecessors.
* see Baron Münchhausen
** see Gulliver’s Travels
*** W. Walther, "Die Gespeircherten Programme des Heron von Alexandria" [The Stored Programs of Heron of Alexandria], Elektronische Rechenanlagen, Vol. 15, No. 3, 1973, pp. 113-118.
3 comments:
Well that sounds reasonable and it shows once again that certain procedures(knowledge) can only be achieved by trusting the ancestors' experiences.
Does being able to program by age of 7 in the early 80's count me in as being an old fart even though I'm 30!!! ;-)
That's what happens when your dad's an engineer and the first computer you got existed the year you were born. Gotta love the silicon valley for that!
Yes I've been using a computer for a good 25 years now.
Expat Traveller: That just puts in line with Ada Lovelace and Grace Hopper.
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