From: heller@altoetting-online.de Newsgroups: comp.sys.transputer Subject: Re: (Ex) Transputerite seeks job tips Date: Sun, 1 Nov 1998 11:08:39 GMT Organization: Barb & Helmut Heller Sender: heller@heller.altoetting-online.de (Helmut Heller) Message-Id: References: Reply-To: heller@altoetting-online.de Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit In article "Neil MacMullen" writes: > Dear All, > I'd be curious to know what other (ex)transputerites are doing > now and how they made the transition to 'mainstream' work. > Any opinions/advice on my position would be much appreciated. Hi Neil, back in 1989 (wow, almost 10 years ago!) a friend and I constructed, built and programmed a parallel transputer-based computer and used it for molecular dynamics simulations. It was our diploma thesis (roughly like a master) in physics and our Prof. liked it a lot. He moved on to the USA and I followed. There we expanded the system to 60 T800 nodes and I worked with it, doing membrane simulations and finally getting my PhD. The US was never Transputer-friendly and this project was always regarded as "exotic", but my Prof. was still delighted and the physics was great and that's all that mattered to me. As far as jobs are concerned, I told everybody about my Transputer work (clearly not an embedded use) and some were impressed, others didn't care, but I think it didn't make much of a difference to them that it had been with Transputers. The important thing was that I had demonstrated to know s.th. about hardware, software, and system design (and physics). After my PhD I moved on, back to Europe (where I come from) and since the T9000 never really hit the market, I had to abandon Transputers and use the programs others and I had written for the Transputers on ready-made, mainstream machines (CRAY, IBM, Thinking Machines, SGI, ...). Naturally occamII code was rewritten in C. Now I work in a big computing center in Bavaria and I think the Transputer work I have done was irrelevant for the decision to hire me there. My hardware experience is no longer necessary, all that counts is that I know how to program message passing programs (or find mistakes in our user's programs), and I think I know that :-) I had a great time working with Transputers, but it's over, past. Some of the knowledge you learned is universal and I would emphasize that, while still mentioning your Transputer-past. At this time, it should be really easy for you to find a new job! Good luck Helmut -- Servus, Helmut (DH0MAD) ______________NeXT-mail accepted________________ Phone: +49-8671-881665 "Knowledge must be gathered and cannot be given" heller@altoetting-online.de ZEN, one of BLAKES7 FAX: +49-8671-881665 ------------------------------------------------ Dr. Helmut Heller, Muehldorfer Str. 72, 84503 Altoetting, GERMANY