Well, Mr. Frankel, who started this program, began to suffer from the computer disease that anybody who works with computers now knows about. It's a very serious disease and it interferes completely with the work. The trouble with computers is you *play* with them. They are so wonderful. You have these switches - if it's an even number you do this, if it's an odd number you do that - and pretty soon you can do more and more elaborate things if you are clever enough, on one machine. After a while the whole system broke down. Frankel wasn't paying any attention; he wasn't supervising anybody. The system was going very, very slowly - while he was sitting in a room figuring out how to make one tabulator automatically print arc-tangent X, and then it would start and it would print columns and then bitsi, bitsi, bitsi, and calculate the arc-tangent automatically by integrating as it went along and make a whole table in one operation. Absolutely useless. We *had* tables of arc-tangents. But if you've ever worked with computers, you understand the disease - the *delight* in being able to see how much you can do. But he got the disease for the first time, the poor fellow who invented the thing. . Richard Feynman
About This Quote

In a story that was originally published in 1946, a company's president, Mr. Frankel, is suffering from the computer disease. He is so engrossed in his work that he fails to notice the deterioration of his system. Instead of stopping work on the project, he becomes more and more obsessed by it.

Eventually his machines begin to break down and the program they are working on does not work properly. His subordinates become annoyed with his presence and do not want him to look over their shoulders while they work on the project.

Source: Surely Youre Joking, Mr. Feynman!: Adventures Of A Curious Character

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