Commercial application

Before I settled in Canada, I spent some time working for a small firm in Vienna, Austria. These were the heroic days of transitioning from the 8-bit world of the Commodore-64 to more sophisticated yet affordable 16-bit platforms. One early contender was the Atari ST: a decent personal computer based on the Motorola 68000 processor architecture, running a graphical operating system (GEM, or Graphics Environment Manager by Digital Research), programmed primarily in the C language.

I was tasked with building a business application, a small business accounting program.

In retrospect, I am not sure, really, if I was up to the task. I worked hard, but my knowledge of the C language was still sketchy, my knowledge of proper bookkeeping practices basically nonexistent. I am grateful to the company owner, Mr. Wedenig, for sticking with me, for allowing me to stumble, and allowing me to learn. In the end, I don't know the program's fate: the development was nearly finished when I left Austria, but whether or not the company was able to sell any copies, I have no idea. At least, it earned us a nice article in the May 1987 issue of XEST, Austria's then-popular magazine for Atari fans.