The Soul of a New Machine by tracy kidder

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 26,2025

This book was a great read from start to finish. It takes you through the journey that an engineering in the 70s went through to get a machine to market. Tracy Kidder writes it in a way that such a dry subject reads like an epic adventure, describing the engineers with so much detail that they feel like the heroes of said adventure. I think what I personally appreciated the most is that it's also a very good time capsule of the computer industry of the late 70s, showing what has changed, but even more so, how much stayed the same. Further more, it's a very interesting case study in how to manage engineers, seeing how much the team was willing to sacrifice just because they got so much freedom and influence in the work they were doing.

I'd say this is a must-read for anyone in the tech industry and a highly recommended read even for those outside of it.

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Chitoge-Tan

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 26,2025

A splendid book (first published in 1981, a year after the release of Eclipse MV/8000) for people who got in touch or are curios about the development process of computers/systems.In essence, a book about computer science and engineering from a journalistic point of view.Even so, the author managed to present many technical details, in order to familiarize the reader about how computers are built and organized.
Moreover, the author traces the computer culture back to its early days, exposing the enthusiasm and the spirit of the engineering teams - " "Part of the fascination," he said, "is just little boys who never grew up, playing with Erector sets. Engineers just don't lose that, and if you do lose it, you just can't be an engineer anymore." He went on: "When you burn out, you lose enthusiasm. I always loved computers. All of a sudden I just didn't care. It was, all of a sudden, a job." "

Further it calls out one of the fears of the engineering teams: " One was the fear of "the big mistake," the one that would be discovered late in the game and would require a major redesign-and with it, perhaps, a fatal delay. " Valid up our days.

On the other hand, in the book is revealed the "dark"/unethical business and management practices which made Data General company notorious. These are reflected in the mental stress of the team that developed a new machine - "La Machine" of 32 bits, in a time where the competition was quite bitter.
On the positive side, we read about the vision of new machines and the challenges/risks a team can face when coming with a novel system.

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Dylderdoodle

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 26,2025

A must read for software engineers.
I gained so many gems from this book and made me reflect on my own career in software.

It’s made me reflect on questions such as
- why did my manager act that way?
- why are we lacking X resource?
- why am I motivated even though it’s not in my best interest to be?

Computers are so much more than the sum of their parts. Although I’ve not been fortunate to work on a project like Eagle, I resonate heavily with the feeling expressed.

The book is an immensely well written, humorous and thoughtful account of the Data general company. I’ll be re-reading it in years to come.

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skywalkeriite

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 26,2025

“A feeling of accomplishment” is what Veres says he has. “But then again, there’s lots more feeling of accomplishment to go.”

The underlying theme of this book, if there is one, would seem to me to be the general feeling that your work needs to have meaning to you. This is a view, in a variety of ways, that most of the engineers seem to hold at this company. The company being Data General, a company I had never heard of, but apparently was quite a big deal in the late 70's and early 80's.

In my own experiences I consistently hear engineers tell me they want a job which allows them to do what they want, which isn't working. My view and a view that seems to be held at everyone at Data General in the early 80's is that's bullshit. I decided to studying computer science and computer engineering because five years ago I was afraid I wouldn't accomplish anything of meaning to the world before I die. As I sit with less than a year before I complete these majors I expect to find meaning and satisfaction from my work, to do that I'm going to have to continue working as hard as I can for as long as I can.

The paradox of choice can get in the way of this search for meaning. We're presented with so many choices that we forget that confusion is natural and fear is normal. These men and women in this novel were on a journey to find themselves and they accomplished that by changing their industry. They weren't for money, although much of it would be found by some, they were looking for meaning. That's what matters.

You shouldn't spend your life waiting to pass the time, or even worse waiting for some final judgement at the end, the real judgement comes everyday.

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StellarIceberg

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 26,2025

This book had a very compelling blend of technical content and a focus on the relationships and idiosyncrasies of the computer engineers behind this amazing achievement. As someone with a computer engineering background, I appreciated the detail given around the architecture of components that make up the Eagle and the process by which they are designed. I think Kidder did a great job of explaining these technological intricacies in such a way that non-technological people have a good chance at understanding and appreciating them, as well. It was very inspiring to learn about the work that so many hardware engineers and microcode programmers poured their souls into for no other reason than to be a part of something bigger.

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