ERIC HASELTINE: I'd like to get started by asking each of you a two-part question: What do computers do today that engineers used to do by hand? And what's the most exciting thing going on in this field?
TERRY HENG: I'd have to go back about 20 years, when I was part of the team that worked on 4-bit microprocessor design at Motorola. In those days, it took us almost 12 months just to lay out that processor. Today you could do that in less than 10 minutes. So the tedious task of having to do all the drawings, all the layouts, all the mess, has been superseded by computers. The most exciting thing going on in the field of computer design, for us, is that we're in the midst of trying to revolutionize the automobile. I think the cars you're going to see tomorrow will be much smarter. A BMW in about five years will have something like 150 microprocessors.
MICHAEL HAWLEY: For me, it's movies. Regardless of what you think of the latest Star Wars movie, every frame is a visual work of art. But it's more than just art. It's a window into an ungodly amount of computation and engineering innovation and talent. All that stuff used to be done by hand, laboriously. I think what's most exciting about it is that probably more than any other driver of demand, motion pictures are forcing machines to have eyes to understand sound and image. They're pushing those two sensory aspects into mainstream computing.
BOB LUCKY: I'd like to ask Mike a question. You recently won the Van Cliburn amateur piano competition using your fingers. Is a computer going to replace your fingers? Why do we have to worry about people being able to move their fingers like you can, very dexterously, to produce great music?
HAWLEY: I'm actually the wrong guy to ask about that because I'm the one who once tried to enter a computerized player piano in the Tchaikovsky Competition, because you could apply by a tape audition.
