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Discussion on: What was your first year as developer/designer like? Got any advice?

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Nick Hodges • Edited

My first year as a developer was pretty fraught with peer-pressure, homework, thinking about girls, and learning to write text-based adventure games.

It was 1974 and I was in the 7th grade. My math teacher, Mr. Schulte, taught us BASIC, which was well-named in retrospect. I'm talking

10 INPUT A
20 LET B = 3
30 LET C = A + B
40 PRINT C

I remember when we discovered GOSUB. It was a revelation.

I remember hearing about Pascal, how it didn't have line numbers, and thinking "That's impossible -- how could that possibly work?"

I remember sticking the handset of the phone into the modem coupler after dialing up a computer at the University of Minnesota.

I remember punch tape and the "Ka-chunk Ka-chunk" of the TTY terminal.

I remember waiting breathlessly for the paper to advance so we could see if we survived the next round of the original Oregon Trail game.

I remember it being fun as hell.