[SIGCIS-Members] [EXTERNAL] Introduction and Humanity and the IBM System/360-descended mainframe

[Eileen Buckholtz]

Hi Gary and Reg,

I have also been researching HARVEST/STRETCH for my Queens of Code
Project--Stories from NSA's computing women--some who worked on the Harvest
project. NSA was the other government site besides Los Alamos that had the
first STRETCH computer and there were a lot of lessons learned from that
development.

I would appreciate any connections you have to any of the women--or men--
who worked on the HARVEST/STRETCH development team.

eCheers,

Eileen

Eileen Buckholtz
Queens of Code Project
queenofcode.com
https://www.facebook.com/queensofcode

On Fri, Jul 17, 2020 at 3:38 PM Reg Harbeck <reg at harbeck.ca> wrote:

> Thank you, Gary. This is an angle I could perhaps spend more time thinking
> about than I have so far. I appreciate the recommendation!
>
>   - Reg Harbeck
>
> On Fri, 17 Jul 2020 19:33:36 +0000, "Grider, Gary Alan" <ggrider at lanl.gov>
> wrote:
>
> Interesting thesis topic.  If you trace 360 back a bit further I think you
> will find that the 360 descended in some degree from Stretch or at least
> what was learned from Stretch.
>
> Since I walk by the building built for Stretch at Los Alamos every day,
> While I am not sure that the Cold War represents the best in humanity, it
> is a slightly different angle to your quest.
>
> Not sure if the Stretch 360 predecessor adds to your humanities angle but
> much has been written about the Stretch project and the people involved
> were a bit of a who’s who in Computing of that era.
>
>
>
> Gary Grider
>
> LANL
>
>
>
> *From: *Members <members-bounces at lists.sigcis.org> on behalf of Reg
> Harbeck <reg at harbeck.ca>
> *Date: *Friday, July 17, 2020 at 1:24 PM
> *To: *"members at lists.sigcis.org" <members at lists.sigcis.org>
> *Subject: *[EXTERNAL] [SIGCIS-Members] Introduction and Humanity and the
> IBM System/360-descended mainframe
>
>
>
> Hello, SIGCIS. I am happy to have joined your listserv and be in such
> excellent company.
>
> I've joined this listserv at the recommendation of Dr. Willard McCarty,
> founder of the Humanist listserv, which I've also joined, and for the same
> reason:
>
> I'm working on my second draft of my thesis for my Master of Arts
> (Interdisciplinary Humanities) with a subject of the humanity of the IBM
> System/360-descended mainframe.
>
> I've been working on that platform since 1987, the year both of these
> listservs were founded, as a technologist and, more recently, ecosystem
> enabler. You can see what I've been up to if you Google "Reg Harbeck"
> "mainframe" - lots of both technical and cultural content.
>
> My research, experience, and perhaps predisposition, lead me to believe
> that the best of our human and humanities history were brought to bear in
> the development and announcement of IBM's System/360 mainframe on April 7,
> 1964. Prior to that, everything from the lessons of deep history (e.g.
> "measure twice, cut once" and other established practical and philosophical
> principles), more recent history (e.g. Jacquard, Babbage, WW II, Turing,
> Von Neumann, Fr. Roberto Busa, etc.), and input from experience and
> experienced users (e.g. the SHARE user group, founded in August of 1955 -
> still alive at SHARE.org) from the first two decades of electronic
> computing, funnelled into the design and creation of this system.
>
> Since then, while the actual platform was used by people studying the
> humanities, including the humanity of computing, until more autonomous
> systems became generally available, its further advances were more driven
> by the practical needs of serving humanity - especially business - than by
> philosophical considerations.
>
> Today, the modern mainframe descended from S/360, aka IBM Z, runs the
> world economy, with the large majority of credit card, financial, tax, and
> other government and business data of record. But most personal computing
> happens on other platforms - for now. But Moore's Law has ended, and the
> world is refocusing from novelty to sustainability, just on time for this
> same mainframe platform to become an increasingly evident option for
> quality cloud services.
>
> All of which leads to my request from this list: I'm still trying to tie
> the threads together well enough to ensure my thesis statement is logically
> supportable by the data I've put together, and my current version of that
> statement, still somewhat in flux, is something like, "The IBM System/360
> mainframe and its successors are a definitive manifestation of the best of
> historical humanity and humanities, and it has continued to develop in a
> definitive role as part of our shared humanity, now and into the
> unforeseeable future."
>
> So I would be most grateful if anyone has any publications or other
> sources they can recommend that speak specifically to these origins and
> this journey. While I have gathered a great deal of data so far, I'd rather
> have the same thing recommended to me multiple times than miss an important
> document that could be the missing link in my thinking.
>
> Thank you all so much for reading and considering this, and for your
> anticipated responses.
>   - Reg Harbeck
> Reg at Harbeck.ca
> +1.403.605.7986
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