A scene from the former that I remember. The principle architect of the machine (Tom West) is talking with Edson DeCastro (CEO of Data General) and is asking for a new oscilloscope to help with the bring-up of the machine.
DeCastro tells West, essentially, he's not authorizing a new, expensive scope. West, flabbergasted, asks why. DeCastro lowers his head, peering over the top of his glasses at West, and says "Because scopes cost money, and engineering overtime is free."
I'm telling this from memory and some of the details are wrong. I guess I should go get a Kindle copy of the book and re-read it. :-)
I read the book when it was new. Just a handful of years later I graduated college and got a job at a start up. One of the guys who interviewed me and ended up in the office directly across from my cubicle was Carl Alsing.
A few months later someone mentioned that Carl was in "Soul of a New Machine" (Carl was the seasoned hand who was in charge of the "microkids", the green engineers responsible for writing the microcode).
I re-read the book. When Kidder first introduces Alsing he sums him up in a few sentences, and damn if he wasn't spot on. Later in the book is an entire chapter about Carl and his unorthodox work habits, and again, it all was so on the mark with what I had learned of Carl firsthand that it gave the rest of the book a great deal of credibility.
House is his other book that clicked with me given I had bought a fixer-upper at the time I read it. I really liked both books but none of the topics of his other books really clicked with me.
