TECHNOLOGY TIDBITS
November, 1998
Number 35
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MICROSOFT'S SOFTWARE LEASING IDEA
In one of the many emails uncovered during the government's antitrust suit against Microsoft is a 1997 memo outlining a plan to charge users an "annual fee" for it's Windows operating system software. The author of the memo estimated that the earliest that such a system could be put into place would be in 2001. A Microsoft spokesperson stated that this was just one idea under consideration and no final decision has been made. (Sources: Infoworld, 11/23/1998 and ComputerWorld, 11/23/1998).

THE FIRST PROGRAMMERS
ENIAC, the first computer, was built in 1945. Newsreel photos taken at the time show the men whom designed and built it. Left out of the photos are the women who programmed it.

The worlds first computer programmers are: Kathleen McNulty Mauchly Antonelli, Jean Jennings Bartik, Betty Snyder Holberton, Marlyn Wescoff Meltzer, Frances Bilas Spence and Ruth Lichterman Teitelbaum. The women, all mathematicians, worked one floor down from where ENIAC was being built. They were employed by the U.S. Army to manually compute ballistic trajectories.

The programming group started to break up after ENIAC was transferred from the University of Pennsylvania to the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland in 1946. Several stayed on for a while to teach programming to another group of women. Eventually all but Ruth Lichterman Teitelbaum opted to return to home. Ruth stayed in the computer field until her retirement in 1983.

More information about the world's first programmers can be found at the Women in Technology International at www.witi.org. (Source: ComputerWorld, 11/16/1998).

WEB SITES OF THE MONTH
Just in time to help you with the holiday stress are this month's selections: the Biobehavioral Institute of Boston www.bbinst.org and the World Wide Online Meditation Center www.meditationcenter.com. The Biobehavioral Institute of Boston features a questionnaire that will help you identify where the stress in your life originates. The World Wide Meditation Center contains a glossary of meditation terms and guidelines for how long you should meditate. There are also pages that help guide you through seven different meditation exercises. (Source: Wall Street Journal, 11/25/1998).
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Technology Tidbits is published monthly by Jerry Price, Eau Claire, Wisconsin
© 1998 Jerry W. Price

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