Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 3.2
Cartoon from
Datamation
magazine, 1968.
In the face of this looming crisis, the existing methods for training
programmers and other computer personnel were revealed as ludicrously
insuffi cient. At this point, there were no formal academic programs in
computer science in existence, and those few courses in computer pro-
gramming that were offered in universities were at the master's or PhD
level. Computer manufacturers, who had a clear stake in ensuring that
their customers could actually use their new machines, provided some
training services. But in the fi fteen months prior to the 1954 conference,
confessed M. Paul Chinitz of Remington Rand UNIVAC (at that point
the largest manufacturer of computers in the world), the company had
only managed to train a total of 162 programmers.
17
He estimated that
the total training capacity of all of the manufacturers combined at a mere
260 programmers annually. And so the majority of computer users were
left to train their own personnel.
18
This in-house training was expensive,
time-consuming, and generally inadequate.
19
Part of the problem, of course, was that computer programming
was inherently diffi cult. As was described in the previous chapter,
