Book · 1981
The Soul of a New Machine
by Tracy Kidder
A journalist embeds with Data General's engineers racing on no sleep to ship a new minicomputer before the deadline kills the project.
What does Reddit think of The Soul of a New Machine?
The same anecdote keeps resurfacing independently: a micro-coder burns out on nanosecond-level debugging and quits by leaving a note about moving to a commune in Vermont, to "deal with no unit of time shorter than a season." r/ExperiencedDevs (↑324) tells it one way, r/sysadmin (↑81) tells nearly the same story without citing each other, which suggests it's the detail that actually sticks from a 1979 book about a 1980 computer. r/programming (↑31) makes the connection explicit, filing The Soul of a New Machine next to "The Story of Mel" as oral history of engineering culture rather than a technical manual. r/learnprogramming's classics lists (↑257, ↑82) put it alongside Hackers and Where Wizards Stay Up Late, and r/compsci (↑24) slots it next to Snow Crash and The Cuckoo's Egg. Sixteen mentions is a small sample. But it's a sample where nobody disagrees, and the same specific scene keeps getting quoted, which is a different kind of signal than raw volume.
Community feedback & reader fit
Themes
- · A race to ship a next-generation minicomputer against an internal deadline
- · Burnout and unpaid overtime inside an engineering team
- · Oral history of computing, grouped with Hackers and The Story of Mel
- · Corporate politics at Data General playing out in the shadow of the more famous DEC
Common praise
- + The commune-in-Vermont burnout story gets retold independently in two different subs (r/ExperiencedDevs ↑324, r/sysadmin ↑81), which means it's the scene people actually remember, not just cite.
- + r/programming (↑31) puts it in the same bucket as The Story of Mel, calling this kind of writing 'our oral history.'
- + Keeps getting handed out as a classics-list entry (r/learnprogramming, r/compsci) instead of fading into recommend-once-and-forget territory.
Common criticism
- − Sixteen mentions across seven years is a thin file for a book this often called a classic; the reputation outruns the visible discussion here.
- − Most of the sample is list-placement, not argument. Commenters cite the one scene rather than explaining why the book works overall.
Who it's for
If you've ever quit a job over a technicality nobody else understood, the Vermont-commune line will land immediately. Engineering-culture completionists pair this with Hackers and Where Wizards Stay Up Late per r/learnprogramming's list, so treat it as one leg of a three-book set rather than a standalone. Read past the burnout anecdote or you'll miss why r/programming calls it oral history instead of a business book.
Mentions over time
Top subreddits
Which Reddit comments matter for The Soul of a New Machine?
The most relevant excerpts across the subreddits where this book is mentioned — opinionated, argued takes first, then top-upvoted mentions. Click through to read the full thread.
“There is a classic book from 1979 called A Soul of a New Machine where a journalist embedded themselves in the workers developing a new mini-computer. The quote that sticks with me, is that a micro coder (think someone who has think in nanoseconds regularly) quits his job with the simple "I'm movi…
“Here's my list of the classics: **General Computing** * But How Do It Know? - The Basic Principles of Computers for Everyone * The Elements of Computing Systems: Building a Modern Computer from First Principles * […
“A few of my favorites: Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution, by Steven Levy Where Wizards Stay Up Late: the Origins of the Internet, by Katie Hafner and Matthew Lyon The Soul of a New Machine, by Tracy Kidder Nine Algorithms That Changed the Future: The Ingenious Ideas That Drive Today's C…
“In *The Soul of a New Machine*, one of the engineers who has burned out while trying to troubleshoot nanosecond timing delays quits and leaves a note on his desk: "I am going to a commune in Vermont and will deal with no unit of time shorter than a season." Personally I don't want to be a farmer, s…
“Love these kind of stories. It's our oral history. Like The Story Of Mel. Also, the Data General Eclipse was featured in [The Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder](
“Big Orgs (large groups of people) don’t operate logically or rationally they operate politically and that means waves of irrationality will appear and dissipate as the technology evolves and people and management (management are just people like you btw) adapt to it If you haven’t experienced that …
“That was such a good show. I'd also recommend reading "The Soul of a New Machine."
“Most of his work is very tech-related. Snowcrash is a great example. The Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage - Clifford Stoll The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Douglas Adams.
“I guess it depends on the person, but here's a few suggestions: If they like Linux/unix, maybe a subscription to LWN.net If they like reading books: - Pragmatic programmer - Knuth books (if they like maths) - Soul of a new machine - Cathedral and the bazaar If they like jokes, yo…
“I really enjoyed *The Soul of a New Machine* by Tracy Kidder
“If they aren't interested in entering the field, maybe a narrative book, like: "Soul of a New Machine", "The Cuckoo's Egg", "Where Wizards Stay Up Late", "Being Digital", or "The Engines of Creation" (about nano tech, but also nano computing).
“A few I've enjoyed: "Where wizards stay up late" is about the development of the internet. "Soul of a new machine" is a cracker. About Data General's efforts to get a 32 bit mini computer to market. The tech all predates me,but he project issues and dramas are all still real today "Showstopper" is…
“Got a BSEE degree in the 90's and got some experience working on lower level stuff, including creating a 16-bit CPU in FPGAs, designing the instruction set, and even writing a small kernel to handle interrupts. That being said, go read "The Soul of a New Machine" to see how much effort it took to ge…
“Hackers. Soul of a new Machine. Tv show halt and catch fire.
“Tracy Kidder’s “Soul of a New Machine” is nonfiction (Pulitzer Prize winning in fact), but possible to enjoy in a similar way to fiction if you consider that its kind of like a (shorter) “Moby Dick” about the monomaniacal development of a class of computers that doesn’t really even exist anymore. H…
Convinced? Pick up The Soul of a New Machine
Readers also mention
Books that share discussion threads with The Soul of a New Machine — counted from the comments, not curated.
The Soul of a New Machine — frequently asked
Is The Soul of a New Machine still relevant for software engineers in 2026?+
The Reddit record suggests yes, though not for the hardware. r/ExperiencedDevs (↑324) keeps quoting the burnout story, an engineer quitting mid-project over impossible timing demands, as a working description of modern crunch, not a historical curiosity. The book is about 1979 minicomputers; the anecdote people repeat is about labor, and that part hasn't aged.
What does r/programming compare The Soul of a New Machine to?+
'The Story of Mel,' the well-known piece of programmer oral history. A r/programming comment (↑31) puts them in the same category explicitly, calling this kind of writing 'our oral history' and noting the book's Data General Eclipse as a specific historical anchor, not a generic tech-history gloss.
Should I read The Soul of a New Machine before or after Hackers?+
The data doesn't set an order. r/learnprogramming's classics list (↑82) names The Soul of a New Machine, Hackers, and Where Wizards Stay Up Late together as foundational computing-history reading, without ranking them. Read whichever era, minicomputers versus the internet's early hackers, interests you first.