Authoring code? What kinda title is that Mr. Horton?
Yep, all of us who write code … we’re all authors. But perhaps that’s another post entirely.
Today I wanted to jot down why I do this crazy little thing called code as well as how I got my start.
Well, first this man and woman had very special feelings for each other. Wait. Maybe that’s too far back. How about we hear about my start with computer programming? That would probably be more comfortable for everyone.
So as of this writing, I’m 46 years old. Yeah, yeah, I know. Older than the internet boom. Older than microwave ovens. Older than the now retired Space Shuttle Program. Hey, the Space Shuttle retired, why can’t I, right?
Moving on.
At the risk of me sounding like the classic old guy of “back in my day we didn’t have water to drink, we waited for raindrops and slaked our thirst that way and we were happy to get it” … I did roofing projects (tearing off and putting on new shingles) with my step dad all summer long to save up to buy my first computer at Radio Shack for $105 and some change. Looking back on it, I really got screwed on the bill rate. But I digress.
I really don’t recall why I wanted a computer. You were probably hoping for some insight there but I think, being a nerdy young dude, and the fact I had a friend who had one … then ipso facto, I wanted one too. So I traded LOTS of my time for that money and grabbed this hunk of plastic from Radio Shack.
The year was 1983. Return of the Jedi was still in theaters. So it was a long time ago, in what seems like a galaxy far, far away …
Turning it on the first time, the glorious Color Computer 2 booted to a green screen with a blinking cursor. It was hypnotic.
“I dare you to get me to do anything, anything at all.” .. that’s all my thirteen-year-old brain heard from that taunting cursor.
Challenge accepted magic box of mystery!!!!!
And I opened the BASIC programming manual and began to learn. (this was mainly due to a lack of money to buy games)
My first commands were certainly fumbling. LOTS of typos. Heck, I still do that. However, I worked my way through that book, learning about loops, conditionals, variables.
I should note here that when I mean I worked through the book, I mean it consumed me. I disappeared. It got bad. My mom even grounded me FROM my room. Oh yeah. Couldn’t go in there except to sleep or to change clothes. I was hooked on programming.
At that time, I couldn’t save anything I made either. No storage media then (again lacking funds and planning). Hours would be spent and sometimes all night typing in code only to have a compile error. With no editor either, the answer was “clear it out and start over”.
And since I couldn’t save anything, after I had successfully created some magic and the fun was over, all that work just disappeared when it was time to shut off the computer. If I wanted to see it again, I had to re-type it all.
So I saved some more money to buy a cassette recorder. Yep. You read that write (see what I did there?) Finally I could type in a program, save it and reload it to use for later. Fun for the whole family.
And then the ideas began to happen.
I’d see my step dad doing estimates at the kitchen table for his construction work. Pen, paper, and calculator.
“I can fix this!”, I thought, “I can make it better!”
With nary a requirement in sight other than that, I began coding a solution. Don’t laugh. Some of you still do this and I can name names.
While the details of the program escape me (it was some sort of calculator for square footage and materials cost) I remember showing it to my first QA tester (hear that as: “my mom”) during demo day (hear that as: “Hey mom can you come here a minute?!? This is awesome!”)
The app .. and I use that term oh so loosely … passed muster. Oh boy, I was ready for prime time. Time to release to the App Store and make … oh wait. Guess I’d do that in 25 years or so. For right then, I just waited for my step dad to come home from work.
He was … underwhelmed.
The magic that had consumed me was lost on him. What he had was “good enough” but he thought “it was neat” what I’d done.
Some might count that as crushing defeat but I somehow did not. I kept on. The love for computers and ultimately technology was born during that time and it’s never let up.
I author code to do what I attempted to do for my step dad. To make someone’s life better. To help them. To remove some sort of pain they are experiencing in what they daily do. To me, this is the dream of technology that was promised with the advent of the personal computer. A way to “work less”.
We could get into that topic some more but that’s another post perhaps.
For me, it’s always been about creating something that is needed, that matters, and that will last. I’ve learned a lot about that over the years. I’ve learned to see if the user even wants something to “be better”. That’s always a good first question. Hey, maybe grandma doesn’t want help crossing the street. Is it right to just grab her and carry her across? Sure you could argue that she got there quicker and with less physical difficulty (minus the flogging you’ll likely receive) but was it “better”?
Better is subjective. That’s why what we do should be need-driven. That was my first foray into software development. It’s ebbed and flowed over the years.
But it started with a single cursor demanding that I make it do something, anything.