%0 Conference Paper %1 ensmenger08shot %A Ensmenger, Nathan %B Society for the History of Technology %C Lisbon %D 2008 %K history maintenance software %T Fixing things that can never be broken: Software maintenance as heterogeneous engineering %U http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~nathanen/research/shot2008.html %X This paper focuses on the problem of maintenance in the history of software. As all of the papers in this session argue, the problem of maintenance is a ubiqui- tous but neglected element of the history of technology. All complex technological systems eventually break down and require repair (some more so than others), and, in fact, as David Edgerton has suggested, maintenance is probably the central ac- tivity of most technological societies.2 But maintenance is also low-status, difficult, and risky. Engineers and inventors don’t like maintenance, and generally don’t do maintenance, and therefore historians of technology have largely ignored it.

@inproceedings{ensmenger08shot, abstract = {This paper focuses on the problem of maintenance in the history of software. As all of the papers in this session argue, the problem of maintenance is a ubiqui- tous but neglected element of the history of technology. All complex technological systems eventually break down and require repair (some more so than others), and, in fact, as David Edgerton has suggested, maintenance is probably the central ac- tivity of most technological societies.2 But maintenance is also low-status, difficult, and risky. Engineers and inventors don’t like maintenance, and generally don’t do maintenance, and therefore historians of technology have largely ignored it. }, added-at = {2009-05-18T01:29:14.000+0200}, address = {Lisbon}, author = {Ensmenger, Nathan}, biburl = {https://www.bibsonomy.org/bibtex/24f287e6d39bf6b66946db9937240f1f2/neilernst}, booktitle = {Society for the History of Technology}, interhash = {f502565b4f4b0d8a88caef12cfaba9eb}, intrahash = {4f287e6d39bf6b66946db9937240f1f2}, keywords = {history maintenance software}, month = {October}, timestamp = {2009-05-18T01:29:14.000+0200}, title = {Fixing things that can never be broken: Software maintenance as heterogeneous engineering}, url = {http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~nathanen/research/shot2008.html}, year = 2008 }