Sometimes, it really is difficult to write about the past.
I have been working with computers for a long time now. I can remember my first time.
It was my freshman year in college, at the University of Miami and Fabio told me about how they used
computers in his line of work. Fabio was a business or
accounting major. I am not sure. I frankly cannot tell the difference. Fabio asked me if I wanted to go to the place
where the computers were at the UM. I said sure. I am
not talking about the computer facility, I am talking about the classroom building
at the UM. The first thing was
connecting to the mainframe. This was
done via a modem connected to the phone. The phone literally sat on a modem and you would dial the number sand it would connect. I am not talking about the phone line, I am speaking about the actual phone. It was a very slow connection, I believe it was a 300 baud which all I
knew was that it was the slowest way to communicate with the computer. It literally asked me if I wanted to play a
game? This later reminded of that movie War
games with Mathew Broderick. The computer did not talk, we just wrote to each other. The movie
was made in 1983. My experience with
Fabio was on or about 1977. It is amazing
how far we have come.
I was asked if I wanted to play tic tac toe. I did, and I was hooked.
I never thought of it as something that would be so useful. I was just very curious at the time. I then took a course in basic and later would
expand how much I would use and depend on computers. In that course, as a final project, I made up a program that would play chase with you. I am being very generous to myself here. All I did was begin the game when you only had two pieces left. And your opponent had one piece left. I had to get the queen with the pawn. It worked okay but both players had to know something about chess. If he defending player just moved away, the player with the pawn would just move back and forth. Oh well.
As I am sure all of you are aware, I am part of a large
family. My oldest brother, most probably
never used a computer. All the way to me
in the family tree, all of us used computers to varying degrees. The younger members of the family used computers or actually studied computer science or engineering. I always wondered at the time if I would have finished my career in chemistry had the opportunity been there for computers. I think I would have in the end.
