Computers: The Early Years: Reflections of an Aging Programmer

Most of us, myself included, don't really appreciate history in the making. You're so involved that it's hard to get a real perspective on it until years later. Then you look back and think, "Wow ... that was really an exciting time ... I got to experience the birth of something that changed the world." That's pretty much my reaction now, almost fifty years after I saw my first computer. Pocket calculators, Macs, PCs, laptops, smart phones and tablet computers have become a necessity in our society these days. My kids can't really even envision life without those electronic marvels. If our computers at home go belly up for some reason, near panic sets in. There are Facebook pages to be kept current, crops to be harvested on Farmville, email messages to be read or sent, bank accounts to be checked, bills to be paid and online shopping to be done. Anymore home life largely revolves around our computers. Hard to believe how much has happened in the world of computers since those misty, long-forgotten pre-computer days. Any yet, for me those days don't really seem all that long ago. In fact I can still remember what it was like back in the early years when I first got interested in the world of computers and computer programming ...