"… my interest in computers came from the 1950s TV and movie renditions of the spinning tapes, flashing lights, and robots running amok…"

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Dennis O'Neill

Born in Brooklyn, New York, USA in 1949
B.S. in Mathematics with a Minor in Physics

Manhattan College, 1971

M.S. in Computer Science

Purdue University, 1973

I first became interested in science and technology in grade school. I enjoyed math and read quite a bit about science outside of school in areas such as astronomy, geology, and paleontology (I didn t know the word then, but I did like reading about dinosaurs and where to find fossils). I also read the Tom Swift series of books and was introduced to "serious" science fiction through the Classics Illustrated versions of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, From Earth to the Moon, War of the Worlds, and The Time Machine. I guess my interest in computers came from the 1950s TV and movie renditions of the spinning tapes, flashing lights, and robots running amok genre of computing. I can still recall those spinning tapes during the credits of "Truman Bradley s Science Fiction Theatre".

When I realized that I actually had to tailor my studies to a career choice, I figured that Math was as close as you could get to computers without having to mess around with vacuum tubes and wires and stuff.

I saw my first real computer when I was in college. It was behind a glass wall, and the only interaction with it was via decks of punched cards that you handed to a high priest in a white shirt, skinny black tie and lab coat. You waited about three or four hours and then picked up your printout. It wasn t until sophomore year that they actually let us write programs ourselves. During freshman year all we did was submit data decks to run against the Prof. s analysis programs. After all, those machines cost several million dollars and had to support the entire student body. You can't let just anyone walk up to a computer and run a program!

As an undergraduate, I worked summers and part time at the International Computing Center at the United Nations Secretariat in New York City where I received my first exposure to computing in the real world. During graduate school, I worked as a programming instructor at the University Computing Center, and later as a research programmer.

My first full-time professional job was at Bell Telephone Laboratories where I did research in database and operating systems. I was there from 1973 to 1977, and during that time I was an early user of what came to be known as the Unix operating system.

I began work at Schlumberger in 1977 as Program Leader for a wellsite computer system at the Schlumberger-Doll Research Center in Ridgefield, Connecticut. During my time with Schlumberger I held research and management positions involved with applications of information technology to oilfield services. In addition to Ridgefield, I worked in Houston, Tokyo, Ridgefield (again), Austin, and finally retired from Schlumberger in Houston in 2001. Currently I am consulting part-time in the IT area focusing on Linux-based supercomputing, and knowledge management.

One of the more interesting projects I worked on was the InTouch knowledge management system; it is described here and here. But the most memorable project was ARIES, a collaboration between industry and government which involved massively parallel supercomputing on the Thinking Machines Corporation s CM-5 machine (which was also used for things other than oil exploration), NASA s ACTS satellite, and Dr. Michael DeBakey of the Texas Medical Center.

I am married with two children, one in college and one graduated from college and living in Washington, DC. I still enjoy reading science fiction and am an avid bass fisherman.