The joys of computing

..computing.

I realised as I poured over specification sheets, internet sites and price lists
that I hadn’t bought a computer since 1989 when I commenced a Post Graduate
course in Computing at the then Chisholm Institute which was soon subsumed into
the cavernous qualification mill of Monash University.
I remember more than twenty years ago venturing with immense fear, doubt, uncertainty
and $3000 of my own real non-inflated coin of the realm into a small shop in
Station Street, East Malvern. I emerged with a beige box of state of the art
computing gear. It possessed, behind its bland exterior adorned with the necessary
Turbo button, the astounding memory of one megabyte, of which the operating
system could reliably address only 640Kb, and a hard disk of five megabytes.
Yes, megabytes and not gigabytes, the latter a term known of in science fiction,
but not in the reality of human purchasable computing.
I stared in awe at the 15” monochrome monitor and thought that the ultimate
vehicle for launching my career as a computer genius had arrived. In fact, the
course at Chisholm, which I had got into by dint of an annoying and unusual
persistence, was something of a nightmare as I struggled at the very edges of
my limited intelligence and understanding. COBOL programmes, Unix operating
systems, database design and system analysis tumbled in a confused trail of
cascading phosphorescent trails down the diminutive screen.
As my background to that date had been in Fine Arts and the painters Jules Olitski
and Mark Rothko were my heroes, rather than the Ken Thompsons, Grace Murray
Hoppers and Gordon E Moores of the computing world, I was at something of a
disadvantage to other recent graduates in higher mathematics and physics.
At Chisholm we shared time and terminals, usually late at night, connected to
some humming distant central computer of erratic disposition and limited capacity,
which I envisioned as being tended by serious white coated-technicians in a
sterile air conditioned room somewhere deep in the bowels of the building. In
all probability it was an outdated Prime midrange computer masquerading as a
refrigerator in the staffroom with attached printer. It was slow, and painful
and incredibly devoid of manuals.
Somehow I passed the course after a final battle with a team assignment, made
incredibly difficult by a temperamental musician with a substance abuse problem,
which meant we were faced with rewriting the most clean and elegant code I had
ever seen, but which didn’t actually do what it was meant to do.
It waltzed beautifully in 5/4 time when all we wanted was a accounting system
for a taxi company.
There is nothing like working 72 straight hours with people who are getting
desperate, hot and sweaty in forty degree heat with an absolutely inflexible
deadline to meet if you want to increase your understanding of the meaning of
the phrase ‘short fuse’. For some reason I thought this was almost
fun and did related work for the next twenty years, which says something for
my masochism and credulity.
Matters at Chisholm had also been complicated by the first appearance of computer
viruses. These appeared out of a black part of hell and caused general consternation
and dismay as machines collapsed with disappearing operating systems and data.
There is nothing so apt to cause dismay as the code handed to you by a compatriot
on a floppy disk causing your machine to turn into a useless hunk of aluminium,
silicon and wire. It should have been a warning that a new industry can been
created by intelligent juvenile delinquents.
Whilst labouring though this keyboard generated complexity I was extolling,
to any one who would listen, the virtues and wisdom of Alan Kay, who was one
of the key developers of the Windowed Graphical User Interface, whilst at the
Xerox Corporation’s Palo Alto Research Center, (PARC). Kay observed that a computer
should be as easy to use as a telephone, a device of apparent simplicity which
hid a complex and sophisticated network. This prognostication has become rather
undone by the increasing complexity of mobile telephone devices, which are as
powerful a device as many a computer, though still hiding a network of incredible
sophistication.
Kay is also famous for coining the phrase, “The best way to predict the
future is to invent it,” which in large part he did.
If you were labouring with the obscure syntax of a command line interface these
were the words of a prophet who spoke the language of commonsense and one that
would have made my life at the time so much.
The work of PARC led to Apple Inc and the development and rise, fall and rise
again of the Macintosh computer in all its various transmogrifications. These,
the world’s most elegant consumer computers, hide the complexity behind
a sophisticated and elegant simplicity and leading industrial design. I loved
Macs ever since I saw and used the first 9 inch black on white display and WIMP
interface in the mid 1980s.
But over the years I have never owned a Mac as over the past twenty years my
places of employment have foisted various Toshibas, IBM’s and “no-name”
specials on me. It is only now that I no longer have gainful employment and
can get back to pretending to have some artistic ability that I have to face
actually spending my own money on a computer.
And I’m still not going to buy a Mac, which is something of an embarrassment
given my espousal of the brand over the years, as they just cost too much money.
Being a bit of a nerd I have done my homework. I have talked to Image Science,
my immensely talented photographer friend Greg Wayn, and read every magazine
and article around. And I think that I can get equal or better performance for
half the price complete with a 30” monitor which is close to the size
of a sheet of Arches drawing paper.
It arrives this week and if it actually works I’ll let you know otherwise
the next blog will be handwritten on PostIt notes.

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