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Comment by wsc981 | Hacker News Reader

I wonder if Woz's response is only in context of Apple. IIRC Steve Jobs did actually code when he worked at Atari.

Edit: Steve Jobs believed that everyone should learn how to program, I don't think that statement would make any sense if he didn't know how to program himself (even if it's just the basics): http://vimeo.com/64572687

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...if by code, you mean stole and rebranded Woz's designs, you're correct:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakout_%28video_game%29

This is covered in iWoz--Woz didn't take it super personally, but it was kind of tacky, and Jobs never mentioned the bonus in his payment discussion for a 50/50 split.

He was hired by Atari int 1973 way before he was assigned to do the Breakout game which was in 1975. I wonder what was his actual job at first. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs#Career

Apparently minor design work and modding other peoples' circuits:

http://web.archive.org/web/20110612071502/http://www.woz.org...

Google image search for atari breakout.

"Coding" in that context is not as relevant

The low-level programming needed for the Apple I is very different from "general programming". It made sense for Woz to do the hardware and the software.

In fact I doubt most "coders" of today could do something simple for an Apple I, even given modern resources (like a ASM compiler).

Woz was one of a kind.

A Mad genius, to paraphrase Ang ( from Avatar the last Airbender )

There is no parallel to him and i don't believe there is anyone who can do both original hardware design and low and high level coding like woz.

I think there are many people who could, but the skills are no longer as remarkable or required in today's world.

Your point is so correct though -- he was a genius, and such diversity of skill should be respected and significantly more valued in the field today.

Wasn't it a slightly less specialized world back then too? The software and hardware were tightly enough linked that you needed someone who could do both. I think Woz is a case of a mad genius being born in the time that suited him.

Nowadays a generalist is someone who can do both the front and back end of a website, let alone assembler or hardware. (That's why I find Jeff Atwood's keyboard work interesting, independent of the caliber http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2013/08/the-code-keyboard.h...)

"Wasn't it a slightly less specialized world back then too?"

Yes. Byte had Steve Ciarcia's articles, which were one of the main features of the magazine. We used to modify and build hardware, not just to overclock it, but piggyback memory chips or talk to bench equipment in the lab.

By the time I got out of high school, military and university I had: Built a pirated Apple II+, etched circuit boards, worked with 20 different operating systems, built radios, modems, remotes, door openers, set up a BBS, repaired TVs and stereos for beer money, modified a radar system and so on...

>" It made sense for Woz to do the hardware and the software."

Well yeah, for the Apple I. But that Basic had limitations, it didn't actually supported float point types and that's why they had to license Microsoft Basic later on.

For a one man effort, that Basic interpreter was very good

But yeah, at that point I believe Microsoft had more experience with Basic interpreters as well as a code base.

MS Basic on MSX for example was very good.

According to Wikipedia, Breakout was created in discrete logic. Not exactly high-level.

I'm talking about Apple, not Breakout

Since when is programing with logic gates easy. Doing it on paper without any kind of visual design tool and simulator is very hard.

"In fact I doubt most "coders" of today could do something simple for an Apple I, even given modern resources (like a ASM compiler)."

It's not a fair comparison.

Coders today don't have to drop to assembly or solder or wire-wrap or burn EPROMS. But it is something that many engineers and hobbyist did back in the day. (Myself included...)(And most commuters today don't have to harness horses up to go to work...)

But given time, I bet Woz or a few of us could teach someone interesting enough assembly to do something useful.

Well, this story doesn't make much sense if he knew how to code at Apple. http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=Calculator_Constr...

Sorry but your comment doesn't make much sense.

I have been programming for 15+ years. It doesn't mean that I instantly know every application framework in existence. Especially the (looking back at it now) the pretty complex way the original Mac OS apps were written.

I think sp332's point is that if you have 15+ years programming and you can't get a guy to produce you what you exactly want, then you would eventually do a prototype by yourself to show them how to do it.

I was thinking, since the drawing functionality was mostly right, Jobs could have tweaked the background color or shadow size manually instead of telling Espinosa to move things around a pixel at a time and waiting for another iteration.

I am honestly bewildered by your thought process here.

If I am getting someone to build me an Android app and I don't know how to do it. Then I am not going to learn Java, SDK, tool chain, build process and buy a device just to show them how to do it. I am going to send them an email and tell them to change it and go back and forth until I am happy.

I don't think you got my point about the story. The pregrammer made an UI utility in few hours so Jobs could design the calculator the way he wanted. A prototype can be done in whatever you already know, so there is no need to learn anything outside your current skill set.

If you aren't able to produce that then probably your programming skills are not higher enough and hence you could say that you can't code (not that is a bad thing anyway)

This is absolutely ridiculous logic. He was doing far more important things at the time than prototyping a calculator, even if he could. These were likely 10 minute flash meetings where he gave direction. This was about time, and time alone.

> "He was doing far more important things"

Apparently for Jobs this was very important to him (he was very picky about details anyway), and if you sum all of his time wasted on each interaction I can see how they are equivalent, he just changed a few UI things anyway.

I get a very different message from that story. The Calculator Construction Kit struck me, the first time I read this, as the ur-program for HyperCard and (especially) Quartz Composer.

I think Steve took one look at it and said "yep, this is how you design a user interface". NeXT and Apple kept coming back to this idea.

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