Tuesday, March 14, 2017

MediTech


I've been reading through these replies about "MediTech" trying to determine if it's some sort of elaborate inside joke I'm not picking up on.
There is a company called MediTech in Massachusetts that uses a derivative language of MUMPS called Magic. I know several programmers that have worked there. There are thousands of engineers writing in this language as we speak.
From what I can remember:

-Only global variables

-Variables must only be capital letters, maximum length 6. If you run out of variables, you must cleverly use them in a routine and set them back to what they are. This means you can't use a name like myVar - you use AAAFD, ZBVCXZ, etc.

-System functions are usually things like ., >, ', ], so code looks like .'AAAF]{\;:..

-Meditech writes all of their own languages, databases, operating systems, tools, etc. You can only write in a non-Meditech language if you get approval from a multi-tiered architectural design board, which barely ever happens

-The founder hated C with undying passion. No one is ever allowed to use C

-All programming hires go through a 6 to 12 month training process to learn the tools, languages, and systems. As they almost exclusively hire non-CS majors, such as math and physics majors, they don't typically have a programming background and don't realize how bizarre the MediTech stack is

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