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Milestones in the History of Computing
A Refusal is not the Act of a Friend:
The Corleone Family Introduces the Y/Y Prompt
By
Chris Miksanek
Johnny Fontane was a well-known S/360 guru. In the mid-seventies, he published several technical articles and was renown for his programming prowess. However, in later years, he stopped honing his skills and three operating systems later, Johnny was a has-been. No one would hire him.
An exciting DOS to ESA project involving a new LU6.2 application was being undertaken at one of the major studios. This conversion was heralded as one of the largest and most significant in the industry. Soon I.S. end-users at the studio would have their own PC workstations networked to a host application on the mainframe. It was a leading-edge application. This project was perfect for Johnny and would put him right back on top.
There was a problem. The CIO of the studio, a guy names Woltz, Jack Woltz, had it in for Johnny. Years earlier, when Fontane worked as a PAII for Woltz, he quit just before the roll-out of a new database system. The project was delayed for months and it weighed heavy on Woltz's performance review. "He made me look ridiculous," Woltz said. "And a man in my position can't afford to look ridiculous!" Woltz swore Johnny was washed-up in the industry.
Johnny had no choice but to turn to his Godfather, Don Corleone, a man not without influence in the industry himself.
Don knew how to handle these I.S. pezzonovantes. Years prior, Johnny worked as a contractor for an aerospace company and was presented with a fantastic offer from a competing company, but the project leader refused to release Johnny from his three-year contract.
Don and his friend, Lou Cabrasi, visited the project leader in the bursting room of his organization and made him an offer he couldn't refuse. Lou held the man near the paper shredder and Don assured him that either the contract or his strutz would be fed into it.
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Years before this
piece,
I wrote this vignette
for my
"History of Computing"
series
THIS MONTH IN COMPUTER
HISTORY:
Shakespeare's greatest
tragedy
Shakespeare introduces
the prompt
It's common knowledge that Shakespeare was a prolific writer. As
senior information developer for Stratford Software, a successful
start-up funded by two venture capitalists of Verona, the great bard
was charged with both user and technical design documentation for
some of the most important MRP software of the late 16th and early
17th centuries. At the time, such applications were typically
commissioned by the merchants of Venice.
But a secret to all except the most astute computer history buffs
is Shakespeare's greatest comedy/tragedy: the user interface for a
CICS on-line application. Because of its propensity to crash at any
hour of the night, the app was coined "A Midsummer Night's Downtime"
and was quickly shelved.
Truly a greater tragedy was the loss of the original documentation
for that app. But scholars of the time were able to archive at least
one menu prompt for posterity: "To log-off or not to log-off, that
is the question. What is your answer? Enter 'Y' to proceed with
session termination." |
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When a representative of Corleone's asked Woltz to grant this favor and give Johnny his second chance, Woltz became belligerent. "Never," he said. "Johnny never gets that job. And just in case Corleone tries any rough stuff, you tell him, I ain't no project leader. Yea, I heard that story."
Woltz had a weakness, though. He was a PC nut and was especially proud of his new 120-meg hard disk and loved to show it off.
One morning, soon after Corleone's representative had arrived back in New York to personally deliver his response, Woltz
woke up next to his disk drive's read/write head and the very next day,
Johnny got the job.
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