I wrote this post roughly 4 years ago, charting my personal computing evolution. I have now been a professional computer engineer for the last 4 years, and I have 2 degrees in the field. I help design graphics chips for a leading semiconductor technology firm. It seems like an unlikely end for a kid who used to wonder how the various chips on a motherboard worked. I used to think that someday if I become really smart I'll know exactly what all these chips do, and what the numbers on them mean. I could have never predicted that I would end up here 20 years ago. I still don't understand what these chips do btw. ;)

Somehow it feels strange to think that computers and I came of age at roughly the same time... my height increased as processor speeds increased. What's even more uncanny is that processor speeds stopped increasing, roughly when my own stature stopped growing. :)

Computers consume my entire day now. I sit in front of one for most of my waking hours... if I am not at work on Linux/Windows machines, I am at home playing on my notebook. I bought three computers in the last 7 years... the first was a Dell Inspiron 8600, the second a Macbook, and the third a Dell XPS. My iPhone is full-featured to the extent that it would outdo the desktop machine we bought 10 years ago. What's more now is that computers are ubiquitous... the Wii console, the DVD player, my iPhone, my LCD TV, my car all have some semiconductor chips in them. What will the world look like 20 years from now?