The Impact of Computer Science on the Development of Oulu ICT during 1985–1990

Abstract

Abstract. The region of Oulu has been emphasizing the importance of electronics industry for its business growth since the 1960s. After a pitch-dark recession, the region developed in the 1990s into a new, well-established hub of information and communication technology (ICT) in Finland. The city with its 100,000 inhabitants occupied nearly 10,000 ICT professionals in 1995. This article will contribute to the body of research knowledge through analyzing the role of computer science, in particular information systems and software engineering, for the development of the ICT industry in Oulu in the latter half of the 1980s. This analysis is based on a variety of both primary and secondary sources. This article suggests that the system-theoretical and software-oriented research expertise played a key role for the rapid and successful ICT business development of the Oulu region.

An Oral History of Programming Practices: Gender and Age Dynamics and

“…There are several studies about the programming languages used historically by computing centers to control the behavior of computer hardware (e.g., Benediktsson, 2009;Nordal, 2009). Much discussion has focused also on computer software industries, their development over time, and the profession of programming (e.g., Gram et al, 2005;Oinas-Kukkonen, Similä, Pulli, & Kerola, 2009). Over the past decades, however, considerably more interest has emerged in programming as an everyday groups that "saw different possibilities in the computer" and "had different experiences as they sought to realize those possibilities" (Mahoney, 2008, p. 10).…”