July 2009 - Members - lists.sigcis.org

Vacuum Tube Development Committee
by Evan Koblentz 09 Sep '10

09 Sep '10

Last week I visited Harvard's archives of the Radio Research Lab, and found some meeting minutes of the Vacuum Tube Development Committee (1943-1945 timeframe) .... I can't find much online that nicely summarizes this committee and its activity / purpose. Can someone here point me to a good overview?

1 1

Semi-rare John Mauchly document
by evan＠snarc.net 01 Feb '10

01 Feb '10

Hi all. I received this document from Bill Mauchly today. I asked him if it's okay to share freely; he said yes. File is attached. Bill added: "In 1979, just a few months before he died, John Mauchly had a letter published in DATAMATION. Examples of his writing are rare, but here he clearly wanted to have his say. In it he laid out very clearly how he and Eckert, in the wee hours of 1944, worked out the stored-program architecture of EDVAC, the successor to ENIAC. Later they told von Neumann, and he published it as his own work. He also talks about BINAC. This was at the time that Burks and Goldstine were trying to drain as much credit away from Eckert and Mauchly and towards von Neumann as they could.I've attached a copy of the letter; it a good read if you like this sort of thing. This short essay does not seem to be available on the web. I typed it in from a copy I had that was among my mother's things, apparently a draft from his TRS-80 word processor, on the prompting of Jean Bartik. Enjoy.Bill Mauchly"

4 3

Another question - "Giant Brains"
by Evan Koblentz 31 Oct '09

31 Oct '09

Was the term "Giant Brains" already popular when Edmund Berkeley used it in his 1949 book title, or should he get credit for popularizing it? I'm mentioning the term in a footnote and want to be sure credit goes to the right source.

17 25

Re: [SIGCIS-Members] computers and management science
by Joel West 02 Oct '09

02 Oct '09

Dear Eden, I share many of Gerard's concerns about the unmeasurability of such claims and even how dubious making them might be. (I also agree with Tom that "management science" is too vague -- does he possibly mean operations research?) However, as a positivist (are there any others on this list?) I am inclined to take the claim at face value and see what they might mean. So while "first" is likely unprovable, I do think it would be interesting to say "most computers were bought to do payroll or missile trajectories and this one was bought to do management science." I suspect it would be relatively easy to document the "typical" motivation or application for computers in the era, even if the actual use (post hoc) is not easily measured. (Ideally, you'd want a list of who had login accounts, and if necessary assume each used their account proportionately). But in some ways, the inputs question is less interesting than the outputs question. If Beer was the first boy in the invisible college of his discipline to have a new toy, what did he do with it? Is there any evidence that this strategic foresight (or dumb luck) enabled him to advance his field in ways that his less-endowed rivals could not? I would find it terribly interesting if Beer has the best computing power but the major advances in numerical approaches to management science were being made elsewhere. IIRC, the field's major scientific prize (originally from ORSA, now INFORMS) is named after a mathematician who made his most important contributions before these sorts of computers existed. Joel On 6:25 PM +0200 7/17/09, Alberts, G. hath said: >What in heaven would be the purport of such claim? Computers were not only expensive, they involved major investments, certainly machines the size of Pegasus. Hence, the legitimation for making such investment was seldomly based on the single use for one field of application, or rather for one department in an enterprise or university. Historians usually can trace the considerations leading to the actual purchase in the company archives. Also one may be able to guess where (in which subdepartment) the first initiative to such deep investment in modernizing business originated. >How the machine was in fact used, once installed, is much harder to reconstruct. Did the administrative support staff actually get to use the computer or were they pushed out by the scientific computers from the laboratory departments. Were management scientists favored before the statisticians and the down to earth daily bookkeeping? In the incidental case where a logbook is preserved, or where a very early computing center kept statistics, one may be able to tell something about who was using the machine. >So, what could be the meaning of "dedicated to"? Was that "dedicated" on the level of legitimation of the purchase, or was it "dedicated" in terms of seconds and minutes of use of the system? Let alone that we could judge the claim of "entirely" or even "first". > >Rather, to us historians being aware of inclusion and exclusion mechanisms around the use of computers, simply power struggles if you will, the claim of "dedicated entirely" made in a first person account has a clear intent. Other users, other interested parties, were succesfully made invisible, at least in the account of the "management science" department. Probably bookkkeeping use didnot count, or was counted under management science in the first place, etcetera. > >Rather than investigating the claim, my suggestion would be to investigate the fact that such claim was made, when and by whom. On 11:11 AM -0400 7/17/09, Medina, Eden wrote: >I am hoping that your collective wisdom might help me check out a claim. The British cybernetician Stafford Beer claims that the Ferranti Pegasus 1 machine he bought in 1956 was the only computer at that time dedicated entirely to applications in management science. Do you know of any other examples of computers fully dedicated to management science applications during this time period? -- Joel West, Ph.D. http://www.JoelWest.org/ Professor, Innovation & Entrepreneurship College of Business, San Jose State University BT 555, One Washington Square, San Jose, CA 95192-0070

6 5

Graduation Announcement
by John Laprise 29 Jul '09

29 Jul '09

Dear Colleagues, I want to take this opportunity to thank all of you in SIGCIS who have supported my work over the past six years. My dissertation "White House Computer Adoption and Information Policy 1969-1979" has been accepted by my committee and Northwestern University. Interested parties may email me for a copy of the abstract and/or dissertation. Best regards, John P. Laprise Ph.D. Visiting Assistant Professor Department of Communication Studies School of Communication Northwestern University in Qatar

1 0

Conference Material on the Website
by NOVEMBER, JOSEPH 29 Jul '09

29 Jul '09

For those of you who are having trouble with the PDF attachment containing the preliminary conference schedule, or who simply prefer to read websites instead of email, please head over to the SIGCIS website (http://www.sigcis.org/)

1 0

2009 Workshop Update
by NOVEMBER, JOSEPH 29 Jul '09

29 Jul '09

Dear SIGCISers, It is my pleasure to report that we received an excellent response to our call for papers for the 2009 workshop, Michael Mahoney And The Histories of Computing(s). It will be held on Sunday, October 18, 2009, at the Hilton Hotel in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. Due to the large volume of good submissions we anticipate a very full and productive day. Attached is the preliminary schedule for the workshop. The session times and lengths are approximate and subject to change. The order of presenters within sessions may change as well. At this point we need chairs and commentators for all of the traditional paper sessions and chairs for the Dissertation Workshop and the Works In Progress Workshop. The chairs responsibility will be to ensure that presenters adhere to time limitsa crucial duty given that we have so much material to cover in just one dayand to manage question-and-answer sessions following each presentation. Commentators for the traditional paper sessions will offer a 10-15 minute analysis of the papers in that session; typically, presenters will send the commentator a draft of their talk at least a week before the workshop. Anyone who is not presenting at the workshop is eligible to volunteer for one of these positions. To volunteer please email Joseph November [november(at)sc.edu] Meal information: We plan to eat lunch at one of the cafes or sandwich places near the conference hotel. It will be pay-as-you-go. Dinner will be in a restaurant in Pittsburgh. We look forward to seeing everyone in Pittsburgh! Joseph November, Program Committee Chair for the 2009 SIGCIS Workshop

1 0

(no subject)
by NOVEMBER, JOSEPH 29 Jul '09

29 Jul '09

Dear SIGCISers, It is my pleasure to report that we received an excellent response to our call for papers for the 2009 workshop, Michael Mahoney And The Histories of Computing(s). It will be held on Sunday, October 18, 2009, at the Hilton Hotel in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. Due to the large volume of good submissions we anticipate a very full and productive day. Attached is the preliminary schedule for the workshop. The session times and lengths are approximate and subject to change. The order of presenters within sessions may change as well. At this point we need chairs and commentators for all of the traditional paper sessions and chairs for the Dissertation Workshop and the Works In Progress Workshop. The chairs responsibility will be to ensure that presenters adhere to time limitsa crucial duty given that we have so much material to cover in just one dayand to manage question-and-answer sessions following each presentation. Commentators for the traditional paper sessions will offer a 10-15 minute analysis of the papers in that session; typically, presenters will send the commentator a draft of their talk at least a week before the workshop. Anyone who is not presenting at the workshop is eligible to volunteer for one of these positions. To volunteer please email Joseph November [november(at)sc.edu] Meal information: We plan to eat lunch at one of the cafes or sandwich places near the conference hotel. It will be pay-as-you-go. Dinner will be in a restaurant in Pittsburgh. We look forward to seeing everyone in Pittsburgh! Joseph November, Program Committee Chair for the 2009 SIGCIS Workshop

1 0

Anyone in Georgia?
by Evan Koblentz 18 Jul '09

18 Jul '09

This week I heard from Ryan Gill, who's an IT worker in Atlanta. Says he was given some copies of ENIAC documents, various ENIAC-era photographs, and some Hollerith cards. He's looking to donate these materials to a university in his area. Ryan's email is rmgill(a)mindspring.com.

1 0

computers and management science
by Medina, Eden 17 Jul '09

17 Jul '09

Dear SIGCIS colleagues: I am hoping that your collective wisdom might help me check out a claim. The British cybernetician Stafford Beer claims that the Ferranti Pegasus 1 machine he bought in 1956 was the only computer at that time dedicated entirely to applications in management science. Do you know of any other examples of computers fully dedicated to management science applications during this time period? Many thanks, -- Eden Medina Assistant Professor of Informatics School of Informatics and Computing Indiana University edenm(a)indiana.edu<mailto:edenm@indiana.edu> www.informatics.indiana.edu/edenm<http://www.informatics.indiana.edu/edenm>

4 3