Go To: The Story of the Math Majors, Bridge Players, Engineers, Chess Wizards, Maverick Scientists, and Iconoclasts-- the Programmers Who Created the Software Revolution

"Go To...is smooth, creamy, entertaining...delightful. It is a sort of Iliad for the computer age." —David Gelernter, New York Times

In Go To, Steve Lohr chronicles the history of software from the early days of complex mathematical codes mastered by a few thousand to today's era of user-friendly software and over six million professional programmers worldwide. Lohr maps out the unique seductions of programming, and gives us an intimate portrait of the peculiar kind of genius that is drawn to this blend of art, science, and engineering, introducing us to the movers and shakers of the 1950s and the open-source movement of today. With original reporting and deft storytelling, Steve Lohr shows us how software transformed the world, and what it holds in store for our future.

Steve Lohr chronicles the history of software from the early days of complex mathematical codes mastered by a few thousand to the 2001 era of user-friendly software and over six million professional programmers worldwide. Traces the scientific research, technological innovations, and personalities who created the software revolution and explores the impact of these accoomplishments on the development of computers and programming A LONE SAILBOAT IN THE DISTANCE makes its way across the ripples surface of Lake Washington in the crisp autumn dusk, famed on the horizon by the skyline of Seattle.