Bio: John Furie Zacharias
by
John Furie Zacharias
John Furie Zacharias is the resident techno-dinosaur. It doesn't mean he is the smartest or most experienced contributor at HelpForum blog, though. It simply means that he is the oldest. His first experience with computing happened when his mother would take him to work with her at the Ford Motor Company's Research and Development building in Dearborn, Michigan. The fancy data center looked a lot like
this, and
this, and
this. It was a very loud place for naptime.
Despite never sleeping as a child -- other than in the backseat of the car while commuting to work or by pulling two ugly green chairs from the office together to make a nest at Ford -- JfZ was able to grow up enough to play little league football, get a paper route, and buy an Atari Super-Pong. The newspaper company also gave him a state-of-the-art home stereo system, the grand prize, as the result of him winning a new customer marketing promotion. The system had an AM/FM tuner, two speakers, a record player, and as a bonus -- an 8-track cassette deck.
Eventually, the constant monotone audio "pong-pong-pong" sound not only paid his mother back for those many sleepless nights by annoying her, but also eventually resulted in JfZ being one of the first kids amongst his peers in grade school to have a television set in his bedroom. Personal home entertainment has rarely been so good, since.
Since those early days, JfZ has worked with an evolving array of mainframes, minis, and PC networks -- and their accompanying operating systems and software applications -- in the fields of academic, medical, financial and military endeavors. Those are stories for another day.
Meanwhile, JfZ's primary task here at HelpForum is to herd the kittens of contributors who possess an impressive collective body of knowledge, experience, and artistic talent. HelpForum contributors are volunteers. They simply offer to share their experience with you in the spirit of helping anyone learn a new skill or concept for the personal pleasure of publishing a better blog.
