- Lots of reference to military applications
- Nuclear reactors and shielding
- FORTRAN!
An interesting note about the applications on the nuclear side: I worked in a semi-high security clearance environment on certain nuclear operations. One item we dealt with in particular was a very old algorithm implemented in FORTRAN. We were attempting to scale the system involved, and the implementation of the algorithm was a major bottleneck.
The algorithm was phenomenally complex (it's nuclear science, after all). And, we had a challenge in documentation that was impossible to clear up with the original algorithm implementors: most of the team involved had passed away more than a decade earlier.
It was one of the neatest programming challenges I've ever encountered. Those old-school engineers were cool, and I wish our industry could keep more of those people around to pass along what they learned and help teach our industry going forward. The technologies may change, but logic never goes out-of-date.
What I noticed is how many references there were to wanting mathematicians to learn to code. It's weird because it's a good idea and I don't see that in job ads any more.
The saddest thing for me is just what an institution IBM has been for America over the years. Having gone to UC Santa Cruz, the Computer Engineering department was started by IBM alums (my advisor was Glen Langdon of Langdon and Rissanen / Arithmetic Coding fame. Other friends/faculty spent time working at IBM Almaden Research where several advances in storage technologies have been produced.
These days, IBM is in decline. Friends/tech blogs/even sites like Cringely -- http://www.cringely.com/ -- note how IBM is quickly trying to shed any semblance to it's old self in names of meeting investor expectations.
IBM isn't the only legacy company in the same situation, we have seen this happen with HP as well as AT&T over the years. Microsoft Research, Google to a point, and Xerox Parc (after a period of decline) are stepping up for some long term/basic research. But, I wonder, will we every see the hey day of IBM Research, PARC, Bell Labs, etc. ever again?
It appears that your view of IBM, and other tech companies in general, are skewed to some degree:
> "These days, IBM is in decline. Friends/tech blogs/even sites like Cringely -- http://www.cringely.com/ -- note how IBM is quickly trying to shed any semblance to it's old self in names of meeting investor expectations."
I believe that is referred to as resource allocation/shifting. All corporations do this, not just IBM. It's not necessarily a bad thing nor good thing, it just is.
> "But, I wonder, will we every see the hey day of IBM Research, PARC, Bell Labs, etc. ever again?"
Simply browsing the technology/science sections on Google News will show what research companies like IBM, Google, etc. are involved in. Sure, Watson is the first thing people think of when they hear of IBM, but that's not their only endeavor. Just off the top of my head, last I read IBM was undergoing research in the areas of quantum computing and optimized processor fabrication techniques.
IBM does quite a bit of research, they just don't blog or tweet about it all the time. Example of just one of their labs, right in the Silicon Valley foothills: http://www.almaden.ibm.com/almaden/welcome.html
And also notice, with transparency, that your work will ultimately contribute to strategies and innovations in the field of power acquisition and, by proxy, literally the death of other humans.
Worth noting, also, minus the overt militaristic references, how similar these job descriptions are to a modern quantitative finance position.
Or "developer". You can probably plot the demise of programming as a respected profession as their titles changes from programmers to "software developers" or "architects", maybe using google books n-gram.
The funny thing about the problems stated at the top is I could imagine seeing a job posting today (maybe even from IBM) with the same problems and thinking, "Wow, I have no idea how I'd go about solving those problems."
It makes me wonder what they were really doing back then vs what a job in those fields would look like today.
Related, I find it somewhat annoying when people abstract the job to such a degree that you can't see the tangible things you'd be working on in that field. I'm all for a "change the world" vision -- I really am, not just qualifying --, but sometimes I'd like to hear up front how they plan to solve that problem.
Compare this to a more recent job posting, which more frequently reads like "Looking for a code ninja to make our photo-sharing app beautiful. You need to be awesome and make shit happen." Funny and sad at the same time.
I'm noticing that a lot of the expectations / requirements are a lot lower. Most are "up to 2 years" experience.
Last time I was job hunting, everything was asking for 5+ years experience in one software stack and multiple frameworks. Sometimes 5+ years in multiple fields. What changed?
What changed over the last 50+ years in computing that might raise expectations for programming experience? The personal computer "revolution" of the 80s and 90s would like to have a friendly word with you. :)
Computing as a whole has changed. We are comparing a time (then) when physicians and mathematicians were the ones laying the ground work for what we have today to a time when people start programming to make video games and cool websites (today).
Also, getting experience back then was fairly difficult. Just getting your hands on a computer to get the experience would have been a challenge. Compare that to today where there are kids, literally kids, programming at home right now. For example, I started programming when I was 17.
I think it's similar to the over-education problem. Oh, everyone has a bachelor's (2 years experience) now we need everyone to have Master's degrees (5-8 years experience).
I'm actually curious if one day there won't be a reversal of the trend...I would think it would be at the point where supply no longer meets demand. But really, who knows.
I love the fact that the problem domains remain so static. Well, that's not strictly true: we have a lot more problem domains with which to contend now, but even our tremendously improved knowledge in operations research, military science, and meteorology haven't led us to consider these "solved problems".
Though I personally wish we focused much more on (1) and (3) than (2) as a society.
It was a time when people thought Artificial Intelligence was either on the way shortly (those who actually used computers) or already here with those Atomic Brains we have now (everyone else).
I just watched the Svengoolie episode of "This Island Earth" and, early on, one of the characters mentioned how that era was called the "pushbutton age". Well, we live in more of a "pushbutton age" now but familiarity breeds contempt; conversely, unfamiliarity breeds a kind of awe, and unreasonable expectations that can leave a bad taste in peoples' mouths.
I personally remember going through it when the Internet was first beginning to trickle down to the masses, pre-Bubble, and I remember thinking that some of those ideas then were patently idiotic. But which!
And in the 1920s, radio went through the same thing, if not bigger. Radio!
Most of these problems, and jobs (with appropriate changes in technologies applied), still exist today, and in greater numbers than in 1958. It's just that the other parts of the industry have grown at a much more rapid pace. This is good to bear in mind when you hear people treat "technology" as synonymous with "web site programming".
[+] [-] jroseattle|14 years ago|reply
The algorithm was phenomenally complex (it's nuclear science, after all). And, we had a challenge in documentation that was impossible to clear up with the original algorithm implementors: most of the team involved had passed away more than a decade earlier.
It was one of the neatest programming challenges I've ever encountered. Those old-school engineers were cool, and I wish our industry could keep more of those people around to pass along what they learned and help teach our industry going forward. The technologies may change, but logic never goes out-of-date.
[+] [-] Natsu|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jmspring|14 years ago|reply
These days, IBM is in decline. Friends/tech blogs/even sites like Cringely -- http://www.cringely.com/ -- note how IBM is quickly trying to shed any semblance to it's old self in names of meeting investor expectations.
IBM isn't the only legacy company in the same situation, we have seen this happen with HP as well as AT&T over the years. Microsoft Research, Google to a point, and Xerox Parc (after a period of decline) are stepping up for some long term/basic research. But, I wonder, will we every see the hey day of IBM Research, PARC, Bell Labs, etc. ever again?
[+] [-] tgflynn|14 years ago|reply
IBM is still one of only very few companies doing truly interesting research.
[+] [-] javajosh|14 years ago|reply
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belphegor
[+] [-] jmsduran|14 years ago|reply
> "These days, IBM is in decline. Friends/tech blogs/even sites like Cringely -- http://www.cringely.com/ -- note how IBM is quickly trying to shed any semblance to it's old self in names of meeting investor expectations."
I believe that is referred to as resource allocation/shifting. All corporations do this, not just IBM. It's not necessarily a bad thing nor good thing, it just is.
> "But, I wonder, will we every see the hey day of IBM Research, PARC, Bell Labs, etc. ever again?"
Simply browsing the technology/science sections on Google News will show what research companies like IBM, Google, etc. are involved in. Sure, Watson is the first thing people think of when they hear of IBM, but that's not their only endeavor. Just off the top of my head, last I read IBM was undergoing research in the areas of quantum computing and optimized processor fabrication techniques.
[+] [-] bretpiatt|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rollypolly|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] look_lookatme|14 years ago|reply
Worth noting, also, minus the overt militaristic references, how similar these job descriptions are to a modern quantitative finance position.
[+] [-] sawyer|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Groxx|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eternalban|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] marshallp|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bialecki|14 years ago|reply
It makes me wonder what they were really doing back then vs what a job in those fields would look like today.
Related, I find it somewhat annoying when people abstract the job to such a degree that you can't see the tangible things you'd be working on in that field. I'm all for a "change the world" vision -- I really am, not just qualifying --, but sometimes I'd like to hear up front how they plan to solve that problem.
[+] [-] sakopov|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Groxx|14 years ago|reply
Last time I was job hunting, everything was asking for 5+ years experience in one software stack and multiple frameworks. Sometimes 5+ years in multiple fields. What changed?
[+] [-] qntm|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kylemaxwell|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] richardlblair|14 years ago|reply
Also, getting experience back then was fairly difficult. Just getting your hands on a computer to get the experience would have been a challenge. Compare that to today where there are kids, literally kids, programming at home right now. For example, I started programming when I was 17.
[+] [-] tim_h|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] laluser|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RollAHardSix|14 years ago|reply
I'm actually curious if one day there won't be a reversal of the trend...I would think it would be at the point where supply no longer meets demand. But really, who knows.
[+] [-] kylemaxwell|14 years ago|reply
Though I personally wish we focused much more on (1) and (3) than (2) as a society.
[+] [-] joshaidan|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jaredsohn|14 years ago|reply
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_science
[+] [-] savrajsingh|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] derleth|14 years ago|reply
I just watched the Svengoolie episode of "This Island Earth" and, early on, one of the characters mentioned how that era was called the "pushbutton age". Well, we live in more of a "pushbutton age" now but familiarity breeds contempt; conversely, unfamiliarity breeds a kind of awe, and unreasonable expectations that can leave a bad taste in peoples' mouths.
I personally remember going through it when the Internet was first beginning to trickle down to the masses, pre-Bubble, and I remember thinking that some of those ideas then were patently idiotic. But which!
And in the 1920s, radio went through the same thing, if not bigger. Radio!
[+] [-] helmut_hed|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] petegrif|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] petegrif|14 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] randomStuff|14 years ago|reply