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Ellen Ullman Quotes

A computer is a general-purpose machine with which we engage to do some of our deepest thinking and analyzing. This tool brings with it assumptions about structuredness, about defined interfaces being...

Ellen Ullman

A computer is a general-purpose machine with which we engage to do some of our deepest thinking and analyzing. This tool brings with it assumptions about structuredness, about defined interfaces being...

Tags: thinking, better

I don't know where anyone ever got the idea that technology, in and of itself, was a savior. Like all human-created 'progress,' computers are problematic, giving and taking away.

Ellen Ullman

I don't know where anyone ever got the idea that technology, in and of itself, was a savior. Like all human-created 'progress,' computers are problematic, giving and taking away.

Tags: technology, progress, giving

About Author
Ellen Ullman is an American computer programmer and author. She has written books, articles, and essays that analyze the human side of the world of computer programming.
She has owned a consulting firm and worked as technology commentator for NPR's All Things Considered. Her breakthrough book was non-fiction: Close to the Machine: Technophilia and its Discontents.

Closed environments dominated the computing world of the 1970s and early '80s. An operating system written for a Hewlett-Packard computer ran only on H.P. computers I.B.M. controlled its software from...

Ellen Ullman

Closed environments dominated the computing world of the 1970s and early '80s. An operating system written for a Hewlett-Packard computer ran only on H.P. computers I.B.M. controlled its software from...

Tags: world, software, early

People talk about computer programmers as if computers are our whole lives. That's simply not true.

Ellen Ullman

People talk about computer programmers as if computers are our whole lives. That's simply not true.

Tags: people, true, talk

Introduced in the 1960s, multitasking is an engineering strategy for making computers more efficient. Human beings are the slowest elements in a system.

Ellen Ullman

Introduced in the 1960s, multitasking is an engineering strategy for making computers more efficient. Human beings are the slowest elements in a system.

Tags: strategy, engineering, human

Staring prejudice in the face imposes a cruel discipline: to structure your anger, to achieve a certain dignity, an angry dignity.

Ellen Ullman

Staring prejudice in the face imposes a cruel discipline: to structure your anger, to achieve a certain dignity, an angry dignity.

Tags: discipline, angry, face

I broke into the ranks of computing in the early 1980s, when women were just starting to poke their shoulder pads through crowds of men. There was no legal protection against 'hostile environments for...

Ellen Ullman

I broke into the ranks of computing in the early 1980s, when women were just starting to poke their shoulder pads through crowds of men. There was no legal protection against 'hostile environments for...

Tags: women, men, early