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Wadiwallah

A blog by iFaqeer
about life, technology and getting by in Silicon Valley

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

AutoCAD was a Girl's Software All Along?  

Was reading in the 'Merc (San Jose Mercury News, hometown newspaper of Silicon Valley) that the AutoDesk was changing CEOs after fourteen years. Now this is the company that makes AutoCAD, one of the first pieces of software I ever heard of, and have had friends that use it all along. Most of them mechanical engineers. Why do I mention that last point? Well, the article revealed to me, so to speak, that the CEO for the last decade and a half or so was one "Carol Bartz"...wha-!!! So my macho mechanical engineer friends have been using a girl's software all along?! Wha-! How do they show their faces every day?! I mean especially when we started, this was a very patriarchal community. I say "when we started" because, at least in the classroom, that rapidly changed even while we were still in engineering school.

But then, that was Pakistan; in the US, engineering remains still very heavily male-dominated, no?At least that's how it seems here in Silicon Valley. I mean, have you looked around you lately? And the funny thing is that if you look at the gender balance on any of those "offshore" teams out in India and other places, but especially in India, what's the gender ratio you see?

Sorry for ranting; but think about it!
posted on The WadiWallah Blog at 5:50 PM