Changes

Lannie says going into programmingwas "just a way to spend somefree time and be creative on my own.You can say it's a form of expression."His expectations have been fulfilled"many times over," he says. "At fitst first I realiy really didn't expect toeven sell programs," Emory says.''"Then I got some ideas and then Istarted selling programs. It's sort oflike a hobby, almost." Dollard says he merely signed up forthe high school computer course and"expected nothing. I fell in love with itand started trying to do everything Icould with it. I didn't expect anything,because computers weren't a big thingthen. People had heard of computers,but they didn't have them in theirhome.''" He started in business as a "a trialexperience" with an ad in 99er Magazinea little more than a year ago. "Making a living is re..!lly really what Iwanted to do when I began," Hartersays. "I thought either I could do thisor get a job with someone else. I'vebeen really lucky. Anyone who canmake money this way is lucky. Anybodywhom we publish-anyone who'snot in the company and we pick themisthem is lucky. Any programmer whodoesn't have his own company is goingto have a hard time. Companies aren'tgoing to be formed as readily as theyhave been, also." Hughes says his expectation was ''"tomake a living in a fun way. I think it'sterrific that people pay me money towrite programs. I do it at home for funanyway. It's not easy, but that's partof the fun. When you solve a problem itgives you such a great feeling." Hughes expresses concern about the''"popular magazine fallacy'' " that' '"youcan be a programmer and make a milliondollars.'· " He also says that puttingcomputers in the schools and ''"sayingthat 20 years from now every child willbe a programmer'' " is like ''"puttingpianos in all the schools and saying 20years from now everybody's going tobe a Chopin. Some have a talent andsome don't." ==DISAPPOINTMENTS== Vaughn says his greatest disappointmentas a programmer was"probably spending about six monthson a bit-map program in machine languageand finding out it was utterlyworthless." With experiences likethis, he says, " sometimes you'll goback to square one and sometimesyou'll say, 'To heck with it.' " Swett says his greatest disappointmentis with ''"the inflexibility of thebusiness community. I have a qualitypiece of software and they'll say 'Isthis for a TI? We don't distribute forTI., '"''"I think my biggest disappointmentis that people don't think third partysoftware is of such quality," Lanniesays. "There's a lot of bad softwareand that tends to reflect on everybodywhen in fact there's also a lot of greatsoftware.''" ''"It was certainly disappointingwhen TI dropped the computer,"Emory says. "I've also been disappointedwith TI and their instructionsfor assembly language-the help thatthey give you with the manual. Icouldn't learn to do it 'til I went to anoutside source.''" Dollard also lists as his greatest disappointment''"that TI pulled out. Mygreatest personal disappointment wasprobably some programs I was lookingforward to writing and I ran out ofmemory space. They were just toobig." This occurred, he adds, before heacquired a disk drive. Harter says his greatest disappointmentis "the limitations of themachine. We' deliberately limited ourmarket to programs anybody can run.I've grown beyond 16K but we're stilllimited to 16K because most peopledon't have any more." However, he adds, "It's fun gettingas much out of 16K as you can." Harter also says that "it would befun getting recognition. People like agame, but people won't know what wasput into it. I'm also disappointed incomputer manufacturers, that theyhaven't expanded their technologymore than they have." ==SATISFACTIONS==