Introduction: Computer Revolutionaries - The Computer Boys Take Over - page 20

trick programs” to “discipline their own efforts so that what they say
they will do gets done on time and in practical form.” 44 In fact, this focus
on theory served computer science well as a disciplinary strategy in the
modern research university; if it did not satisfactorily meet the needs of
industry, then so be it. Professional certifi cation programs run by the
professional societies—such as the Certifi ed Data Processor (CDP)
program offered by the National Machine Accounting Association
(NMAA, or later the Data Processing Management Association, or
DPMA)—also proved unsatisfactory for various reasons. 45 The computer
programming business appeared to many to be a free-for-all in which
“anyone with ten dollars can join the ACM and proclaim himself a
professional computer expert.” 46 The competing pressures to regulate the
industry while at the same providing enough programmers to meet con-
stantly growing demand proved diffi cult to balance.
Perhaps the most important reason why the “personnel problem”
dominated the industry literature during the late 1950s and early 1960s
has to do with a fundamental structural change in the nature of software
development. It was clear to most observers during this period that not
only were many more programmers required to meet the demands of a
rapidly expanding industry but also that the type and range of skills
required of programmers had changed and expanded dramatically. The
mathematical training essential for scientifi c programming was seen as
being increasingly irrelevant in the business context, which stressed the
application of specifi c knowledge, training in systems analysis, and the
ability to work well with others. New programming languages were
developed that highlighted the specifi c needs of corporate programmers:
legibility, ease of use, continuity with older data processing systems
(as was the case with RPG), and the ability to be read and understood
by corporate managers (an ostensible selling point of COBOL, for
example).
A Crisis in Programmer Management
The increasingly widespread use of the word software—which as we
have seen, included not only computer code but also the tools and pro-
cesses used to create it—emphasized the systemic dimensions of comput-
erization projects. Describing the products of computerization as
software—as opposed to applications or programs, for instance—implied
a much larger organizational role for computer personnel. As Willis
Ware argued in a 1965 editorial in the trade journal Datamation , “It is