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Interview With Mac Co-Creator Andy Hertzfeld

Posted by timothy on from the debt-of-gratitude dept.

jeblucas writes "MacDevCenter interviews Andy Hertzfeld: formerly of Radius, Eazel, General Magic, and most famously, Apple. He discusses his recent book, Revolution in the Valley as well as sharing some anecdotes about his time at Apple developing the Macintosh personal computer. Check out this notebook page from the first cut of the memory layout. The book was reviewed here earlier."

12 of 165 comments (clear)

  1. I have a joke: by master_meio · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    What's the difference between an American IT worker and an Indian IT worker?

    The Indian IT worker has a job.

    1. Re:I have a joke: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      IT jobs are a commodity now. It won't last for India either. If noone has noticed, China and India are in a really bad place right now. Both have massive populations their natural resources are strained to even feed, both are facing desertification, both are gearing up economically but there isn't the resources in the rest of the world to power their industries, and both are
      looking around the world to satisfy their needs more than most people realize.

      Take India for instance. Twenty years ago, some wells that were providing water from a depth of 2-3 meters are now drawing water over 200 meters in depth. This is due to India's poor infrastructure to control and manage water wells. As a result, there are an untold number of unregulated wells drying the land out and the
      monsoons can't replenish the water (some guess the number is around a million or so). What happens when a country the size and populace of India runs out of food and water?

      How about China? Nearly the same thing is happening to them. Plus China's aggressive water policies are dramatically changing their dynamics in ways that are unpredictible ,with consequences that are unforseeable. Plus, they are deep in a industrial revolution that NEEDS fuel. In ten years, I'm pretty sure they will be looking at the Middle East with drool-dripping fangs and lust in their eyes. With their gender ratios way out of whack, they can field a 100 million man army EASILY and I don't see many countries in the world who could resist that without nuclear intervention.

      And there is a hidden danger related to those two few realize. That's Canada.

      Canada has been allowing liberal immigration and has been courting the world business-wise to lessen their dependance on the US's economy. This translates into...

      East Indians have realized a long time ago of the impending danger, and has skillfully placed many East Indians in the immigration offices of Canada. The result has been a huge influx of East Indians have moved here and the plans have been laid to bring millions more over. As the desertification presses India even more, the trickle will become a flood and Canada will have to close it's doors to the refugees. I have a feeling that won't go over well considering the pressure to leave India and the amount of sympathisers who will already be living in Canada. If this is realized too late, there will be enough East Indians living in Canada to 'control' the politics enough to force the flood of immigrants to continue. Think about what happens when the realization of the flood of East Indians into Canada and a very long and generally unprotected boarder between Canada and the US hits. How would 200-400 million East Indians living in Canada affect the US? I don't want to think how the US will respond.

      Or with China? Canada has been doing a lot of business with China recently. Canada has resources and China wants them. What happens when China, energy starved, begins to invade the Middle East for fuel? Most likely Canada will close it's boarders and I can easily see China's dependance on Canadian resources become a huge crisis. As it is right now, they are dependant on Canadian nickel exports. And industry depends on nickel. Without it, there are many alloys that are necessary that can't be made without nickel. China is enjoying an industrial revolution just like the US did, and as a result they are enjoying a certain level of wealth that's very addictive and hard to give up when everything runs out. And when they become hard pressed, it will be easy to justify military action to 'protect' their way of life (sound familure?).

      Unfortunately, most of our problems are related to our problem of over population. We are about four billion people too many for this planet. Ecological collapse isn't a question of if, it's a question of when. And when it does, humanity (or nature) will have to find a way for balance to return and hopefully we choose a less messy way like birth control instead of the more likely war-plag

    2. Re:I have a joke: by Perl-Pusher · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      Your 100% correct, the biggest problem facing mankind today is overpopulation. There are not enough resources on the planet to sustain the population. With the advances we've made in medicine, the fact that war despite what the media reports, is steadily declining worldwide. And the fact that all of the modern wars kill less people than previous wars. There were more people killed in WWII and it's immediate aftermath (Stalin) then all the wars fought since combined. There is nothing except mother nature, or a really big war to bring things back into balance. Since countries that are democracies as a rule do not make war with each other and tend to use economic pressures to maintain the status quo, an agressive China is almost inevitable.

  2. fp by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    fp
    -A

  3. erst by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    post

  4. wow by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    fp

  5. 22K + 4K + 20K by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    apparently equals 36. Take a look in the left margin. Apple's finest.

  6. A Hertzfeld Story by mickyflynn · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    One time when I was a Sophomore in High School, my friend was experimenting with dialboard.com, when it then still had free parts. Anyway, we got a wild hair to use Yahoo! People Search to look for this guy. We found his number and called him, but he didn't answer. WE left a 5 minute voice mail saying how cool he was and shit like that. We tried to call again a few days later, but he'd changed his number i guess because it didn't work. WE tried to search, but he didn;t show up this time. And that is my Andy Hertzfeld Story.

  7. Re:Also good: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    "What do you think that other OS share it's memory a toaster oven."

    That's not even a complete fvcking sentence! Proofread, Jackass!

  8. Re:Also good: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    why don't you SEAT DOWN and SHUT YOUR FUCK UP

  9. No News Post About Xserve update? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    What the hell is /. about if you can't post a story about the 3 products released and updated yesterday.

    What the hell is this section here for?

    I wrote an article, posted the stats and details of the update but it wasn't posted. are you morons?

  10. Some things never change by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    20+ years later, Steve Jobs is still parking a silver Mercedes in the handicapped spots in the Apple parking lot.