Netizens: On The History And Impact Of Usenet And The internet [Reviews]

technical detail. Readers will not learn how computers work or why certain problems proved more difficult than others, in particular, the problems of programming. The chapter on software is quite cursory, essentially stopping in 1969 and ignoring the development of the programming languages and techniques now current in the industry (Chapter 11, “The Shift to Software,” describes the products, not the processes, of microcomputer programming). The section on soflware engineering suggests that after 1969, the writing of software was on its way to becoming a “real engineering discipline,” an art transformed into a science. But that has not happened yet, and it would seem of some historical significance that the field seems as little able to develop large systems on time, within budget, and in conformity with specifications as it was 30 years ago. The authors describe the vicissitudes of 09360. They say nothing of the troubles of OS/2 or, for that matter, of Windows 95. “As in constructing a bridge,” they write, “it was important that a software artifact should have an aesthetic appeal, but it was far more important that it should not fall down.” That may have been the aspiration at Garmisch, Germany, in 1968, but the companies with the uninsured satellites on Ariane 5 would hardly agree that it has been realized, and users of personal computers know that the bridge may give way at any moment, launching their work into dead cyberspace. But those are quibbles, I am exercising the reviewer’s prerogative to express what I would have written. For its purpose and its scope, Computer is a tine book, accurate and judicious. In its concern for the larger contexts within which the computer has taken its evolving forms, it sets a new standard for the history of computing.