Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979) • Hacker News Board

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#41

Post by joezydeco » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:24 AM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #36

thought_alarm wrote: post #18

If it were possible to send a modern software engineer back in time to that era, would they have any usable or employable skills in such an environment? (besides the uncanny ability to correctly predict the future)

I could probably crank out a workalike clone of DOS 1.0 in a week or two :-)

Back then it took a week just to compile DOS 1.0.

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#42

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:24 AM UTC

frozenport wrote: post #30

thought_alarm wrote: post #18

If it were possible to send a modern software engineer back in time to that era, would they have any usable or employable skills in such an environment? (besides the uncanny ability to correctly predict the future)

Would they want to be employed in such an environment? Imagine spending long hours trying to fit your code into 128k?

[deleted]

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#43

Post by pcurve » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:27 AM UTC

aswanson wrote: post #25

I love the 70s computing aesthetic along with the fashion. So unapologetically idiosyncratic.

Just curious, what do you find idiosyncratic about the 70s computing aesthetic?

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#44

Post by reedlaw » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:29 AM UTC

thought_alarm wrote: post #18

If it were possible to send a modern software engineer back in time to that era, would they have any usable or employable skills in such an environment? (besides the uncanny ability to correctly predict the future)

I don't think some modern engineers would be successful back then because today many rely on the abundance of online resources, code schools, and such. I was only 2 at that time but when I learned programming on an Apple II+ a few years later I was entirely dependent on having a mentor (my father). I wouldn't have known where to go for help or what books to read otherwise. There was no concept of going online as far as I was concerned and the only way to get basic information about computing was through the network of people you knew, where only a small percentage of which had any interest in computers.

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#45

Post by jcurbo » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:42 AM UTC

Since the author is wanting to sell the original photos, you'd think someone at Microsoft's corporate archives dept (I assume they have something like that) or PR would snap these right up.

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#46

Post by mahmud » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:42 AM UTC

thought_alarm wrote: post #18

If it were possible to send a modern software engineer back in time to that era, would they have any usable or employable skills in such an environment? (besides the uncanny ability to correctly predict the future)

Today's CS graduates are much better educated than people in those days. Early programmers wasted much of their energy fighting the platform, reverse engineering undocumented features, and haggling vendors for better access.

Today, you just focus on the problem and take the underlying platform for granted. Free Software has liberated computing from vendor-reliance.

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#47

Post by pcurve » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:47 AM UTC

jcurbo wrote: post #45

Since the author is wanting to sell the original photos, you'd think someone at Microsoft's corporate archives dept (I assume they have something like that) or PR would snap these right up.

Looks like that will happen now.

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#48

Post by pcurve » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:52 AM UTC

alain94040 wrote: post #13

pcurve wrote: post #7

And this is what these folks are up to now. http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-1978-photo-2011-1?o... Some of them have done reasonably well.

After that, it doesn't look like she did much else. She raised her children and became a volunteer Not a great way to phrase things...

Yep, I think it's just poor phrasing.

I just read it as "it doesn't look like she pursued her career further"

I don't think the author meant to downplay difficulty of child rearing.

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#49

Post by univerio » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:52 AM UTC

pcurve wrote: post #7

And this is what these folks are up to now. http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-1978-photo-2011-1?o... Some of them have done reasonably well.

It annoys me mildly that they switched the order of then/now half way through.

Re: Photos at Microsoft Corp (1979)

#50

Post by dasil003 » Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 2:54 AM UTC

kaspm wrote: post #20

thought_alarm wrote: post #18

If it were possible to send a modern software engineer back in time to that era, would they have any usable or employable skills in such an environment? (besides the uncanny ability to correctly predict the future)

Of course they would have usable skills - general understanding of computing, superb analytical minds, 36 years of advancement in education, excellent problem solving ability. At most they would have to learn a new lexicon of programming languages and operating systems which are FAR less complicated than the current range of languages and design patterns software engineers must master today. A few weeks (days?) of st…

I agree with this for the top n% of programmers, but keep in mind there are orders of magnitude more "software engineers" employed today than back then, and many of them are employed in very narrow niches with very powerful tools. Certainly I've seen a great number of so-called programmers that would be utterly unemployable in such low-level environments as we had in the early 80s.