Re: Chipsandcheese article on the CDC6600

On Mon, 22 Jul 2024 10:43:44 +0300
Niklas Holsti <niklas.holsti@tidorum.invalid> wrote:

On 2024-07-22 3:05, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

On Sun, 21 Jul 2024 22:21:41 +0000, MitchAlsup1 wrote:
 

IBM CEO said something to the effect:: How can a team of 24 people,
including the janitor, beat IBM ?? 

 
 From Watson’s memo:
 
     Last week Control Data had a press conference during which they
     officially announced their 6600 system. I understand that in
the laboratory developing this system there are only 34 people,
     including the janitor. Of these, 14 are engineers and 4 are
     programmers, and only one person has a Ph.D., a relatively
junior programmer. Contrasting this modest effort with our own vast
     development activities, I fail to understand why we have lost
our industry leadership position by letting someone else offer the
     world’s most powerful computer. 

 
 
Per Wikipedia, Cray's reply was sardonic: "It seems like Mr. Watson
has answered his own question."
 
 
 

At the end, the influence of 6600 on computers we use today is close to
zero. On the other hand, influence of S/360 Model 85 is massive and
influence of S/360 Model 91 is significant, although far less than the
credit it is often given in popular articles.
Back at their time 6600 was huge success and both Model 85 and Model 91
were probably considered failures.