Version 1.4.3 - February 12, 2026
The first program that I worked on after completing Programming Specialists training, was a 3D graphical program created by a small team of programmers. I was lucky to have the oppurtunity to prove myself, by learning how to program the 3D system that the Adage 3D terminals used. I was able to do that because I had to wait for the final acceptance of my Top Secret/ESI security clearance. During the 6 months that I was waiting, I worked on training courses in IBM Assembler, Fortran, Cobol, PL/1, and IDMS. All of the programming language courses had the same final problem of solving a B-52 mid-air refueling coordination problem. While doing that training, I took it upon myself to complete the Adage 3D training, even though I only had very limited access to a 3D terminal.
The software during its demo stage just showed a 3D sphere with political boundaries and some fake B-52 sorties. During the 5 years I was there, the software grew in functionality to allow creating/planning sorties and to display several types of supporting data including terrain when you zoomed in. The terrain was only located in rectangle areas called TERCOM maps, and were used for guidance of AGM-86 cruise missiles. I couldn't have asked for a better way to learn programming in 1980.
In 1983, the software was used to help visualize how a B-52 (58-0161) had crashed into a mountain near St. George, Utah. They could see that the B-52 was crabbing to the left and its forward radar was looking to the left of the peak that it hit
The equipment used as a workstation was an IBM 3270 terminal with a light pen connected to an IBM 3084 Mainframe. The graphics terminal was an Adage 4370 3D vector monitor with 4096x4096 resolution. with 3D trackball, 6 analog dials, light pen, and 32 function keys.