Eagle Berns

Who was Eagle Berns?

Eagle Berns worked for over thirty-five years in the computer software industry at Apple Computer, Oracle Corporation, and Software Publishing Corporation. During his tenure at those companies he established a reputation for forming strong R&D teams, and focusing their energies on producing high quality software products in a timely fashion.

After obtaining his BS and MS in computer Science at Washington University in St. Louis, he was a systems programmer at Stanford University for sixteen years

In the early 1980s Eagle co-wrote the Apple II computers games Pie Man and The Coveted Mirror and published them through Penguin Software. With both, his accomplished goal was to create games that were both entertaining and non-violent. Later Eagle also co-wrote the Macintosh version of the Graphics Magician for creating animation.

From late 1984 until 1989 Mr. Berns was at Apple. He started as manager of the group responsible for the software for the Apple IIgs machine. The Apple IIgs shipped on time, with what was recognized at the time as some of the best software and GUI interface to appear on the market. Eagle then transferred to the Macintosh Development organization, and after a short time as manager of languages for the development systems group, replaced his boss and remained at Apple as manager of DSG for the rest of his time at Apple. During this period, he was responsible for products which included MPW, HyperCard, ResEdit, and AppleScript. Here also, he was able to produce quality products in a timely manner by focusing his energies on the organization structure made up of developers, QA personnel, and documentation people. Many of his management skills evolved from extensive management training courses provided by Apple.