Robert Fabian

Early software programs, as open source advocates like to remind us, were free. But were only operable on the machines for which they were written. Many of these early programs came at no-cost extras with the purchase of the hardware.

Everything is going the digital route

Does programming have a future? This simple question has two easy answers: yes, and no.

In the late 1980s, the Software Engineering Institute of Carnegie Mellon University (www.sei.cmu.edu) introduced the first Capability Maturity Model. The version in wide current use was published in 1993 as the Capability Maturity Model for Software (SW-CMM), version 1.1.

Back when I started to learn about computers, universities typically offered few computing courses. My first degree was completed back in 1961

There is a growing alarm in Canada, and elsewhere, about the outsourcing trend. Some IT jobs have already moved from North America to lower cost locations in Asia and Eastern Europe. The fear that more IT jobs will move is one of the forces holding down IT salaries and reducing the new entrants to the field.

In a previous column I argued for the importance of IT procurement, and for the benefits that can flow from following best practices in IT procurement.

Early mainframe even helped to foster the concept of online dating