Biography

“Sometimes life's going to hit you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did.”
― Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs book cover by Walter Isacsson

Steven Paul Jobs was born on February 24, 1955, to Joanne Schieble (later Joanne Simpson) and Abdulfattah "John" Jandali, two University of Wisconsin graduate students who gave their unnamed son up for adoption. His father, Abdulfattah Jandali, was a Syrian political science professor and his mother, Joanne Schieble, worked as a speech therapist. Shortly after Steve was placed for adoption, his biological parents married and had another child, Mona Simpson. It was not until Jobs was 27 that he was able to uncover information on his biological parents.


As an infant, Steven was adopted by Clara and Paul Jobs and named Steven Paul Jobs. Clara worked as an accountant and Paul was a Coast Guard veteran and machinist. The family lived in Mountain View within California's Silicon Valley. As a boy, Jobs and his father would work on electronics in the family garage. Paul would show his son how to take apart and reconstruct electronics, a hobby which instilled confidence, tenacity and mechanical prowess in young Jobs.


While Jobs has always been an intelligent and innovative thinker, his youth was riddled with frustrations over formal schooling. A prankster in elementary school, Jobs's fourth-grade teacher needed to bribe him to study. Jobs tested so well, however, that administrators wanted to skip him ahead to high school—a proposal that his parents declined.


Not long after Jobs did enroll at Homestead High School (1971), he was introduced to his future partner, Steve Wozniak, through a friend of Wozniak's. Wozniak was attending the University of Michigan at the time. In a 2007 interview with ABC News, Wozniak spoke about why he and Jobs clicked so well: "We both loved electronics and the way we used to hook up digital chips," Wozniak said. "Very few people, especially back then had any idea what chips were, how they worked and what they could do. I had designed many computers so I was way ahead of him in electronics and computer design, but we still had common interests. We both had pretty much sort of an independent attitude about things in the world. ..."


sources :


http://www.biography.com/people/steve-jobs-9354805
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/20/steve-jobs-biography-obama_n_1022786.html
http://allaboutstevejobs.com/bio/bio.php

His life and career - interactive

"We started out to get a computer in the hands of everyday people, and we succeeded beyond our wildest dreams."-Steve Jobs

Steve Joobs introducing the new Macbook 

Steve Jobs' vision of a "computer for the rest of us" sparked the PC revolution and made Apple an icon of American business. But somewhere along the way, Jobs' vision got clouded some say by his ego and that he was ousted from the company he helped found. Few will disagree that Jobs did indeed impede Apple's growth, yet without him, the company lost its sense of direction and pioneering spirit. After nearly 10 years of plummeting sales, Apple turned to its visionary founder for help, and a little older, little wiser Jobs engineered one of the most amazing turnarounds of the 20th century. He was behind such products as the Macbook series, Ipad, Ipod and most of all the Iphone that took the world with storm. We learned about him and his success through his own products. 

sources:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/interactive/2011/oct/06/steve-jobs-life-career-interactive
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01980/steve-jobs-6_1980157c.jpg
http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/197538

Steve Jobs childhood

"Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower." - Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs setting up the first Apple desktop keyboard

Steve Jobs was baorn on February 24, 1955, to Joanne Carole Schieble and Abdulfattah Jandali, who was a professor of political science. His mother was an American while his father was from Syria. A week after Steve's birth, he was put up for adoption. Justin and Clara Jobs, residing in Mountain View, Santa Clara County in California, adopted Steve and named him Steven Paul. His childhood home is on the Los Altos street. It is a 3-bedroom 2-bath house built in 1952. That was where Jobs stayed during his childhood years. It was also where Apple was born. Jobs spent his childhood in the South Bay area. His childhood house has always been a tourist attraction. The area where he lived later came to be known as the Silicon Valley. He was a student of the Cupertino Junior High School and then Homestead High School in Cupertino, California. It was here that he attended his first electronics class and made friends with Bill Fernandez, who was equally passionate about electronics. During the early years of his education, Jobs attended after-school lectures at the Hewlett-Packard Company in Paulo Alto. The company hired Jobs and there he got an opportunity to work with Steve Wozniak, who would later co-found Apple Computers with him.

After completing his schooling, Steve Jobs was admitted to the Reed College in Portland, Oregon. He dropped out from college but continued with his calligraphy classes. This course would later help Jobs in creating multiple typefaces for Mac. This was perhaps a classic example of the fact that nothing learned is ever wasted! During the years he was learning calligraphy, no one would have probably thought that calligraphy would form the basis of the font system in Mac. But it did. He had a dream to make it big; he had an ambition to redefine technology and the way people use it. He believed in his dreams and made them come true.

A look at Steve Jobs' childhood years tells us of the kind of person he was. They say, winners don't do different things; they do things differently. And Steve Jobs lived by this. He died on October 5, 2011 and will continue to stay in the minds of his admirers.

sources:

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/steve-jobs-childhood.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/opinion/sunday/steve-jobss-genius.html?pagewanted=all
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/stevejobs