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2023-08-31 4:38 am
Hi. I'm the current new guy or one of them. I'm Jim, from Ohio, old guy. I spent 40 years working for two Fortune 500 companies, about 20 years each. The latter one was IBM.
I've been tinkering with computers and electronics as a hobby for more than 40 years. So I know a bit, but I also get stuck sometimes, and it will be nice to have a place where I can find help from those who know more than I do. Hopefully I can give some back as well.
Just to demonstrate my age, shortly after I started college my university introduced a new major: Computer and Information Science. That sounded better to me than the Engineering courses I'd been taking, so I changed majors to the "new" field and never regretted it.
This year I built a breadboard computer based on the work of Ben Eater and James Bates. (If you're unfamiliar with them, search Youtube for their work. Ben, in particular, is a very good teacher.) My breadboard computer is spinning away on the kitchen table right now, but it isn't fully reliable. I'll probably be looking for some help with that, but that's not the first thing that I will bring up.
My first topic will be the Mecanum wheel robot that I just finished. But not here, this isn't the right forum for that discussion. I'll start a new thread in a more appropriate place.
Jim
2023-09-14 8:14 pm
Hi Jim, and welcome. I'm new here as well, and just like you, I worked decades in tech. I'm sort of an "old guy" too. When I entered college they called it Computer Science and Data Processing. We still had a punch-card lab that was the center of my academic life, long before I got to actually touch a computer (which was an IBM 370). I did have a programming class in high school (using a DEC PDP-8) which is where my computer interest really took off.
The technology that we have access today is beyond anything I had dreamed of back then. It is such a great time to be a tech hobbyist! I'll be sure to check out the breadboard computer, it sounds like great fun.
Tim
2024-04-02 2:07 pm
@jimgilliland Hi Jim, I also worked at IBM from 67 to 81. Your name sounds familiar, did we ever cross paths? I am in Canada but I had trips to several US sites for various reasons.
First computer 1959. Retired from my own computer company 2004.
Hardware - Expert in 1401, and 360, fairly knowledge in PC plus numerous MPU's and MCU's
Major Languages - Machine language, 360 Macro Assembler, Intel Assembler, PL/I and PL1, Pascal, Basic, C plus numerous job control and scripting languages.
Sure you can learn to be a programmer, it will take the same amount of time for me to learn to be a Doctor.