Old Time Computing
Lyrics Copyright 1984 Stephen Savitzky.  CC by-nc-sa/4.0.
        To the tune of ``Old Time Religion'' (traditional)

    Give me that Old Time Computing
    Give me that Old Time Computing
    Give me that Old Time Computing,
    It's good enough for me.

Oh the slide-rule's age is hoary
It has passed its hour of glory
But lives on in song and story
And it's good enough for me.

Oh the decimal system lingers
Used for counting on your fingers
Good for children and filk singers  
And it's good enough for me.

Charles Babbage got things started
But he's long dead and departed
Left poor Ada brokenhearted
But he's good enough for me.

The machine designed by Turing
Has a history quite stirring
And it slowly keeps on whirring
And it's good enough for me.

Oh we all adore Grace Hopper
After COBOL you can't stop her
There is no-one who can top her
And she's good enough for me.

Herman Hollerith is cursed de-
signed the punch card and what's worst he's
Buried face down nine edge first he's
Buried deep enough for me.

Dear old FORTRAN's still among us
Just keeps spreading like a fungus
But for crunching jobs humungus
It's still good enough for me.

Algol 60 had recursion
And though some say it's subversion
We've rejected the new version
60's good enough for me

LISP has deeply-nested EXPR's
CONSes CADDAR's and FEXPR's
So it's only used by experts
But it's good enough for me.

Old computers dwarfed their makers
With their tubes and circuit breakers
And they sprawled about for acres
But they're good enough for me.

Oh the IBM six-fifty
Had a memory quite nifty
On a drum revolving swiftly
It was good enough for me.

Oh the sixteen-twenty's famous
Couldn't add so who could blame us
When we called it ignoramus
It was good enough for me.

Well the B Fifty-Five Hundred
Thought in Polish and we wondered
Whether Burroughs might have blundered
But it's good enough for me.

Though computers seem like magic
We can think of other adjec-
tives that border on the tragic
And that's quite enough for me.



Online:
    http://Steve.Savitzky.net/Songs/oldtime/lyrics.txt

Automatically generated with flktran from ../Lyrics/oldtime.flk.