The Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder

Title: The Soul of a New Machine Review
Author: Terrence L. Brown

The Soul of a New Machine

by Tracy Kidder

Gray Planet Commentary

• Technology is dated, the process and the writing are not.

Gray Planet Indices

• Good Book Index: 93/100
• Literature Index: 91/100
• Magic Factor: 80/100

In his Pulitzer Prize winning book The Soul of a New Machine, Tracy Kidder gave most people who read it their first and only introduction to the technical complexity and addictive nature of designing modern computers. First published in 1981, The Soul of a New Machine tells the story of a group of engineers at Data General who form a “Skunk Works” and design an advanced (for the late 1970s) 32-bit minicomputer—the Eagle. The group is led by experienced design engineers, but the majority of the detailed work of designing logic and writing software is taken on by very young and inexperienced engineers hired for the project. In the parlance of computer engineering, they are well suited to the task since they “don’t know what they can’t do.”

Kidder delves deeply into the process of the design, implementation, and debug of the machine, and in doing so educates the reader with descriptions of how it all works. Kidder’s descriptions are generally quite good and understandable. I should know—from 1984 to 2016 I was a computer engineer and I experienced all of what Kidder describes.

This introduction to computer architecture, and particularly to debugging prototype computers, would have been enough for most, but Kidder makes the story so much more by peering as deeply into the souls of the engineers as he does into the soul of the new machine. His narrative descriptions of the lives of the managers and engineers who create the machine are as important as the machine itself. It is their stories that bring the book to life and create an unforgettable reading experience. In many ways, this is a book that could have been written by John McPhee, and I consider that the highest praise.

It is amazing to me that, 38 years later, the book is not dated, only the technology is. But if one substitutes designing custom chips for designing the circuit boards of the Eagle, most of what Kidder describes could and does happen today.

It is also interesting to see Kidder discussing computers and what they mean to society. “To some the crucial issue was privacy.” He says in Chapter 13. At another point, the manager of the Eagle project comments that a danger of using computers is “You end up making people so dumb they can’t figure out how many six-packs are in a case of beer.”

Indeed.