
IBM 1959 Job Post - wave
https://p.twimg.com/AeuClYxCMAIxMdV.jpg:large
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jroseattle
A few observations:

    
    
      - Lots of reference to military applications
      - Nuclear reactors and shielding
      - FORTRAN!
    

An interesting note about the applications on the nuclear side: I worked in a
semi-high security clearance environment on certain nuclear operations. One
item we dealt with in particular was a very old algorithm implemented in
FORTRAN. We were attempting to scale the system involved, and the
implementation of the algorithm was a major bottleneck.

The algorithm was phenomenally complex (it's nuclear science, after all). And,
we had a challenge in documentation that was impossible to clear up with the
original algorithm implementors: most of the team involved had passed away
more than a decade earlier.

It was one of the neatest programming challenges I've ever encountered. Those
old-school engineers were cool, and I wish our industry could keep more of
those people around to pass along what they learned and help teach our
industry going forward. The technologies may change, but logic never goes out-
of-date.

~~~
Natsu
What I noticed is how many references there were to wanting mathematicians to
learn to code. It's weird because it's a good idea and I don't see that in job
ads any more.

~~~
mseebach
Yes you do. The branching out just happens already at university. The coding
mathematicians are known as computer scientists.

~~~
ams6110
Anecdotally, most computer scientists I know (excluding undergrads... I'm
talking about PhDs, graduate and professional academic researchers etc.) don't
write code and do a fairly poor job when they try.

~~~
mseebach
Sure, but certainly they had the same problems in 1959. My point was that CS
is a branch of Mathematics.

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jmspring
The saddest thing for me is just what an institution IBM has been for America
over the years. Having gone to UC Santa Cruz, the Computer Engineering
department was started by IBM alums (my advisor was Glen Langdon of Langdon
and Rissanen / Arithmetic Coding fame. Other friends/faculty spent time
working at IBM Almaden Research where several advances in storage technologies
have been produced.

These days, IBM is in decline. Friends/tech blogs/even sites like Cringely --
<http://www.cringely.com/> \-- note how IBM is quickly trying to shed any
semblance to it's old self in names of meeting investor expectations.

IBM isn't the only legacy company in the same situation, we have seen this
happen with HP as well as AT&T over the years. Microsoft Research, Google to a
point, and Xerox Parc (after a period of decline) are stepping up for some
long term/basic research. But, I wonder, will we every see the hey day of IBM
Research, PARC, Bell Labs, etc. ever again?

~~~
tgflynn
What about Watson ?

IBM is still one of only very few companies doing truly interesting research.

~~~
ilamont
_IBM is still one of only very few companies doing truly interesting
research._

Can you qualify that? Almost every big technology company and thousands of
small ones have teams of smart people conducting interesting research across
many fields. Take a look at any issue of _Wired_ or _Technology Review_ (or
the top links to HN on any given day) to see some examples.

~~~
tgflynn
I probably should have said "important" instead of "interesting".

How many of those companies are doing research that can be compared to what
came out of Bell Labs in the 60's and 70's - the transistor, the laser, ... ?

IBM's work on advanced semiconductors and Watson certainly qualify. The later
will probably be seen as one of the most important developments in the history
of humanity and it wouldn't have been possible without the former.

~~~
adrianbye
its pretty hard to know what is important in the moment.

~~~
batista
Not really. Lots of people knew that the laser was important, that Xerox park
stuff was important, that C/Unix was important, etc even at the time they were
introduced.

~~~
ams6110
In the case of the laser, there may have been some sense that it was
important, but at the time there were no immediate applications and it was
called "a solution in search of a problem."

~~~
batista
In Wikipedia though it says that "Gould’s notes included possible applications
for a laser, such as spectrometry, interferometry, radar, and nuclear fusion.
He continued developing the idea, and filed a patent application in April
1959."

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rollypolly
Notice the lack of reference to rockstars, ninjas, or brogramming.

~~~
look_lookatme
And also notice, with transparency, that your work will ultimately contribute
to strategies and innovations in the field of power acquisition and, by proxy,
literally the death of other humans.

Worth noting, also, minus the overt militaristic references, how similar these
job descriptions are to a modern quantitative finance position.

~~~
javert
The military is a tool. Like any tool, it can be used for bad things, and it
can be used for good things. Without having a military, we would be up shit's
creek.

I think you should be more thankful of and respectful towards the people "in
the trenches," and also the technologists, who make it possible for _you_ to
live in a safe place and spend your time according to your desires.

~~~
burgerbrain
Consider for a moment who that military decided needed killing en mass during
the decade following the topic of discussion. Where all those communal farmers
really threatening our way of life? When this army got it's ass kicked and
left with it's tail between its legs a few years later, leaving those farmers
to live their own lives as they chose to, did our society come crashing down?

Why didn't it?

There are no Mongol hoards waiting to invade, suggestions to the contrary come
from those who profit from the fiction and those who buy into it.

~~~
javert
_that military decided needed killing_

No, _politicians_ decided that. That's an important distinction. If we don't
like what the military is doing, we need to place blame where it belongs: on
the politicians.

 _There are no Mongol hoards waiting to invade_

The military is still highly important. Think about the role it played in the
Revolutionary War, Civil War, and WWII, to name a few wars that most consider
to have been justified for the US to enter. More recently, the Gulf War where
Hussein invaded Kuwait. I personally believe that in the future, Iran and/or
North Korea will acquire a nuclear weapon that threatens US citizens. Somali
pirates. Who knows what else will come up. We still need a military.

~~~
burgerbrain
So if the military does something and it is bad, then it isn't their fault
because politicians made them do it. But if the military does it and it is
good, then they deserve our praise and thanks....

Do you recognize the problem here?

Regardless, this whole thought that we should be "thankful" to the American
military is absurd. They have _billions_ of dollars to spend every year, why
do they also require thanks? Do tanks run on thanks?

No. Thanks is needed because without the blinding effect of popular societal
support, their actions do not stand for themselves. The military requires
praise to be shovelled onto it like coal into a furnace 24/7 so that its hired
guns can continue to lie to themselves and sleep at night. Listen, if you
think they should have thanks, then do it yourself; however it is not your
place to scold others who want nothing to do with it.

~~~
javert
(1) The military deserves praise or blame regarding how well they do,
_militarily speaking_ , and the politicians praise or blame regarding
political decisions. You're conflating the two.

(2) And, yes, you should be thankful that someone is willing to defend your
freedoms.

(3) I don't scold people who don't thank the military; I scold people who
denigrate the military. Actually, it's not scolding, it's showing a more
rational way to think about it.

(4) I've enjoyed this, but I'm done here.

~~~
burgerbrain
[1] I only recognize that a distinction _could_ exist when we restrict the
discussion to conscripted armies.

[2] I assert they do nothing of the sort.

[3] Call it what you like, telling people that they should be more respectful
of the military when they express concern about being, by proxy, responsible
for a loss of life, is... I don't even know how to describe it. Lets say
"insensitive of the humanity of others".

[4] Cheerio

~~~
angersock
Perhaps the most unforgivable thing you've done here is forced me to weigh in
on the side of javert. >:(

If you cannot separate political policies from military ones, you cannot
pretend to argue usefully about this.

 _"I only recognize that a distinction could exist when we restrict the
discussion to conscripted armies."_

You need to further elaborate on this, because one easy interpretation is that
you have no idea how to reason about volunteer armies. I'm not going to even
go into more esoteric arguments about how "volunteer" anything actually is--
just consider that the military does not (except in some bizzaro world some
people seem to want to live in) spontaneously go to war. The politicians guide
policies, the politicians set agendas, and declare wars and deploy troops (for
our sake here, I consider the President in the politician camp).

(I'll also argue that things like what the CIA/Homeland Sec. do that require
drones and such are wrong, so save it.)

It is wrong to inflict injury on another human being (we could argue this, but
let's not). That said, surgeons cut to good effect, police detain suicide
attempts, and bouncers eject unruly patrons. We can argue that harm is being
done in all those cases, but to good effect.

More to the point, though, javert is saying that the military deserves praise
in terms of how effective/professional they are, and you did not disagree
beyond saying that the divide between politics and force was beyond you.

You cannot with a straight face tell me that you refuse to agree that the
(American) military is due praise for their ability due to their given
directions--while at the same time participating in this community here on HN.

Tell me, what is the cost of pushing consumerism and advertising on people?
What is the cost of buying the latest and greatest smartphone? What is the
cost of the shinier, faster computer? What is the cost of developing games and
amusements to distract and destroy manhours of productivity?

What is the cost of datamining to circumvent privacy and better target ads? Of
streamlining sharing of information about friends who wouldn't do so
themselves?

So, please, by all means, criticize those dumb sociopaths in the military--but
hold yourself to the same goddamn standard when talking about the majority of
your fellow hackers!

------
bialecki
The funny thing about the problems stated at the top is I could imagine seeing
a job posting today (maybe even from IBM) with the same problems and thinking,
"Wow, I have no idea how I'd go about solving those problems."

It makes me wonder what they were really doing back then vs what a job in
those fields would look like today.

Related, I find it somewhat annoying when people abstract the job to such a
degree that you can't see the tangible things you'd be working on in that
field. I'm all for a "change the world" vision -- I really am, not just
qualifying --, but sometimes I'd like to hear up front how they plan to solve
that problem.

------
sakopov
Compare this to a more recent job posting, which more frequently reads like
"Looking for a code ninja to make our photo-sharing app beautiful. You need to
be awesome and make shit happen." Funny and sad at the same time.

------
Groxx
I'm noticing that a lot of the expectations / requirements are a lot lower.
Most are "up to 2 years" experience.

Last time I was job hunting, everything was asking for 5+ years experience in
one software stack and multiple frameworks. Sometimes 5+ years in multiple
fields. What changed?

~~~
tim_h
Probably the availability of people with 5+ years of programming experience.
It was 1959! :)

~~~
Groxx
I don't know. Essentially every place I've contacted I've asked about that
clause. Not _one_ actually expected to find it, but they all listed it.

5+ years seems to me to be a strange expectation. That would mean you've had
either multiple failing jobs and might be an undesirable, or you've been
somewhere for 5+ years. If you've been there for 5+ years, what's motivating
you to leave? Where do people expect to find these vast pools of highly-
skilled jobless people who have experience with <software stack X> in <field
which employs a couple thousand people nationally> within <narrow time
window>? That they never find any seems to underscore how irrational the
'requirement' is in the first place, but I see it everywhere.

~~~
groovy2shoes
I remember reading a job ad back in 2003 that wanted someone with 5+ years of
C# and .NET experience. I assume the position was filled before 2006. (It's
possible but unlikely that they were solely looking to poach Microsoft
employees.)

~~~
richardlblair
This happens a lot. HR ends up being in charge and comes up with requirements
that don't make much of any sense.

~~~
xxpor
I think it's breaks down like no experience = SDE 1

2 years = SDE 2

5+ = SDE 3, regardless of language.

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kylemaxwell
I love the fact that the problem domains remain so static. Well, that's not
strictly true: we have a lot __more __problem domains with which to contend
now, but even our tremendously improved knowledge in operations research,
military science, and meteorology haven't led us to consider these "solved
problems".

Though I personally wish we focused much more on (1) and (3) than (2) as a
society.

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joshaidan
The first thing I noticed that none of the positions were asking for degrees
in Computer Science. All math and physics. Before its time I guess.

~~~
jaredsohn
Wikipedia says the first CS degree in the US was at Purdue in 1962. (And the
first internationally was at Cambridge in 1953.)

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_science>

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savrajsingh
It's amazing how so many of those projects remain largely unsolved today.

~~~
derleth
It was a time when people thought Artificial Intelligence was either on the
way shortly (those who actually used computers) or already here with those
Atomic Brains we have now (everyone else).

I just watched the Svengoolie episode of "This Island Earth" and, early on,
one of the characters mentioned how that era was called the "pushbutton age".
Well, we live in more of a "pushbutton age" now but familiarity breeds
contempt; conversely, unfamiliarity breeds a kind of awe, and unreasonable
expectations that can leave a bad taste in peoples' mouths.

I personally remember going through it when the Internet was first beginning
to trickle down to the masses, pre-Bubble, and I remember thinking that some
of those ideas then were patently idiotic. But _which_!

And in the 1920s, radio went through the same thing, if not bigger. Radio!

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helmut_hed
Most of these problems, and jobs (with appropriate changes in technologies
applied), still exist today, and in greater numbers than in 1958. It's just
that the other parts of the industry have grown at a much more rapid pace.
This is good to bear in mind when you hear people treat "technology" as
synonymous with "web site programming".

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petegrif
Love the pencil. Nice period touch.

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randomStuff
I noticed none of the software jobs were in India.

