A student studying for a Master's degree in Data Analytics asked me to summarize the rise of computer technology, so I wrote this...
I became interested in computers because I was trying to write fiction, but found that trying to hunt and peck with a typewriter was very difficult for me. I could not type a page without having to use “whiteout” (painting over what I had typed) almost every other line. I was trying to write manuscripts to send to publishers and magazines, but because my mind seemed to always jump ahead of my fingers, I always made mistakes, time and time again.
In the 70s, I worked as an administrator in the construction business, and when I would type contract specifications into the mainframe terminal I discovered that if I made a mistake, I could just “backspace” and retype over my mistake. This ability to fix mistakes “online” before it was printed was for me a major benefit for computers and led me to become more and more interested in the field.
Throughout the early 80s I worked in offices as the early Apple machines and then IBM PC became available. Spreadsheets, notably Lotus 123, were among the first commercial software products available and allowed financial data to be updated and automatically recalculated. Then it was discovered that they could be used for changing assumptions for the future and became a modeling tool. Then databases began to appear, which allowed historical information to be stored and easily searched for and reformatted. But most of all, for me, the arrival of word processors meant I was freed from the tyranny of the typewriter. But now working with computers had "temporarily" (for the next 15-20 years) overtaken my desire to be a professional writer. It certainly paid better.
Programming languages appeared, like Dbase III, and later FoxPro that allowed for "high level programming" of simple repetitive jobs that could automatically run again and again by the users themselves. In the late 80s, One of my first successful projects was creating a program that took name and address data and other information, and created letters to be automatically formatted, along with envelopes, all printed with the new "lasers" printers. This saved literally weeks of secretarial work, and suddenly management was paying attention to what I was doing.
At the same time, the "Desktop Wars" were raging, fighting out who would be the dominate operating platform. In the beginning DOS was king. DOS was limited to 640 Kb (2/3 of a megabyte) of memory space, so programs had to be very slimmed down. There were several commercial version of DOS (disk Operating System) available, with Microsoft being one of them. Microsoft’s version was not nearly as technically advanced, with several of its competitors allowing more than 640 K to be used in under certain situations. At this time the primary functions in business were document production (word processing) , accounting (spreadsheets) and data storage and retrieval (databases). A number of very functional products became available for business . Soon they were being shipped a integrated packages, with all three products linked together, allowing information to be shared from one program to the other.
As the value of these systems became proven, the focus shifted to the "infrastructure” required. For me, specializing in networking came next. Now data no longer needed to be put on disks and manually carried from computer to computer, but allowed a networked “disk” to be shared across the office. There was no “WiFi” in the 80s and early 90s, so cabling needed to be laid in order to connect the systems. The office was connected by “hubs” which allowed several systems to be connected to one linked line to the “server”.
The “Server” was a networked system, basically the fastest PC the company could afford. The first network system that became populate was “Novell” which created a proprietary network signal system or network protocol called IPX. It was relatively easy to set up (at the time "easy" meant sitting and changing 30 or more floppy disks one after the other to format the network operating system's hard drive, a task that often took 8-12 hours at a stretch. One mistake late in the process required starting all over again). But Novell only scaled for small networks (256 users or less).
Then Microsoft jumped into the “network wars”. They came out with their protocol called “NetBEUI” competing with “Novel’s IPX” as then basic signaling protocol. Their server was can “NT” which also ran on the highest performance PC available. Among small businesses Novell and Microsoft NT were the two primary file sharing systems of the late 80 and early 90s. They were popular because they were relatively easy to set up and used basic PCs as their servers.
But the larger “Internet” network loomed, and that was run on a 3rd protocol called TCP-IP. This required a new Internet protocol which could scale to larger and larger networks. This protocol, TCP-IP began to replace Novel’s IPX and Microsoft's NetBEUI. Gradually TCP-IP began to dominate, and moved into the Microsoft and Novell space by retrofitting TCP-IP into those systems.
During this time, (80s to mid 90s) the “Internet” was a small isolated “toy” that had been living solely between universities and a few government agencies since 1969. Gradually government and business began to see the need to transfer information over long distances. The only usable Internet application consisted of simple text based email. But soon it became possible to query remote databases, so now business need the “hubs” with intelligence that could distinguish destinations. These were called “routers”, and they could distinguish if the email or query was going to business X in Kansas City, or University Y in Berkeley. This led to the rise of Cisco, (as well as a host of smaller competitors). Understanding the router's complicated operating system, and the various routing protocols became the ticket for even higher paying jobs for computer techs.
Moore’s Law, an axiom credited to one of the founder's of Intel, stated that chip capacity doubled every 2 years. It soon proved to be accurate and began to move the needle. The 640 K barrier was broken and the race to populated the newly available memory and processing space began. Microsoft’s founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen saw that the future was in graphically writing to the screen which would allow whole “objects” to be manipulated rather than just the ASCII text. At first their new operating system “Windows” was a disaster. It was slow and buggy. But gradually as more memory space became available, and processor became faster, the product began to take off.
So now networks became "enterprise wide" in large corporations, with tens of thousands of users connected together, all expecting fast seamless access to data anywhere within their geographically dispersed company . This required a faster network infrastructure. Switches began to replace hubs. The first switches did not “route” but allowed networks to be segregated, allowing for greater security and speed. Soon switches and routers became collocated on the same equipment And the distinction between the Internet and the Enterprise began to blur..
In the last years of the old century it was discovered that a programming shortcut on mainframes might soon cause a massive problem. Because in the early years, memory and programming space was the major constraint, so "years" were stored with only the final two digits, with “1999” stored as “99”. In 2000, it was feared that all financial data would be understood as 1900. This led to a major overhaul of software leading up to the New Millennium. It was the first public inkling of the problems that might be coming in software functionality and security.
The “Web” and browsers like Netscape and Microsoft Internet Explorer began to appear and soon began to be used as the “interface” for Internet applications. Now a single window could be used for all manner of information sharing and management.
Moore’s Law continued to be in force into the new century. More memory made for bigger more sophisticated applications. As data being shared across the world became more important and critical, security began to be a priority. Applications had been developed very fast, with an emphasis on access and ease of use. Holes in these applications soon became easy to find and exploit.
Software security and reliability became a major industry. Applications became dependent on other applications, not necessarily co-located. Someone complains - The “app” is slow or no longer working. What is causing it and who is to blame? As data became more and more time sensitive, but the location and responsibility for that data was spread across the globe, availability became a major issue in IT. But the easier it was to access data, the less secure it became. Applications that observed and reported on other applications as well as security hardware (packet filtering "firewalls") and software (virus detection) became huge players in the market.
All of these products required skilled personal to install and configure them. This led to the rise in salaries and created IT budget issues. Companies were finding more and more of their expenses went to supporting these increasingly complicated IT infrastructures. A great deal of resources now went into “automating” the installation and configuration of systems. This led to a consolidating of the industry. Fewer and fewer players in the various systems could keep pace, and soon only a few enterprise hardware and software players were left on the field.
Finally we had the rise of “open source”. Linux was created by a Finnish programmer named Linus Torvalds, and rather than patent and protect his Intellectual property, he just gave it away. Linux was a version of one of the “oldest” programming language Unix. It was an open program from the beginning and most of its adjacent applications like “Sendmail” (email) and file management were developed in Universities and soon were being enhanced to run behind the Web environment. This led to a revolution in marketing. These super powerful and complicated applications were no longer a product but a platform for advertising and product promotion. Google, the ubiquitous search engine arose, and provided their free service that was based on advertising. Now all the products of the early years – data management, word processing, and many others were “free”.
A.I. has now arrived, and it is taking us into another realm, which we are all experiencing in real time. Where that takes us is the current subject of a world wide conversation. A.I. itself is inserting itself into that conversation.
Perhaps it is time to let Sarah Conner out of the mental hospital and let her be in charge.
