Today in 1980, Data General (DG) introduced the Eclipse MV/8000 at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City.
Known internally as Project Eagle, the 2-year development of the 32-bit “super-minicomputer,” the engineers working on it, and the parallel (and eventually, failed) development of a competing DG product, became the subject of Tracy Kidder’s Pulitzer-prize winning The Soul of a New Machine, published in 1981.
A 1988 unpublished history of Data General argues that “Both author and company took risks as the book and computer project developed. Neither fully understood what the other’s project was about or how it would turn out. One risk to Data General was that the book or excerpts of it might be published or leaked before Eagle landed and the MV/8000 announced… On the other hand, Kidder was concerned that the book be kept clear of any taint of Data General sponsorship or commercialism.”
And it goes on to describe a book-promotion event arranged by the publisher: “[It was held] on a Saturday morning at the DEC Marlboro (Ma.) plant’s main lunch hall where both Kidder and West spoke. The hall was mobbed for the event with standing-room only. Although little advance notice of the meeting was made, every computer designer or electrical engineering student in New England was there or tried to get there. Since neither Kidder or West were practiced public speakers and both of them felt uncomfortable in directly promoting a ‘commercial’ publication, a format was decided on that got both off the hook: they would have a conversation that everyone would listen to; later, questions would be taken from the floor.
“A sample exchange at the meeting illustrated the friendly tension between parties – Kidder: ‘Had I known that ‘Eagle’ would turn out to be such a successful computer, I might have done some things differently in the book.’ West: ‘Had we known your book would be so successful, we might have done a few things differently, too.’
“Someone asked West at the meeting if he had read the text of the book before publication. West said: ‘Yes, I did, but my hands trembled a lot.’”