New Manager: "The most technical ever!"

Something unusual happened a while back at work. While I almost never write on my web site about work, I am making an exception here for reasons that will become apparent as you read more.I came under a new manager lately, let us call him S. When I was checking with colleagues who know him better than I do, one made the comment: "He will be the most technical manager you have ever had".I never made much of this comment until I had a chance to work with S closely on a project. What is amazing was that he is really hands on to a degree that you cannot imagine. He knows where the source repositories are, knows which part does what, and will sit and debug code with you, knowing the ins and outs of development.That depth of knowledge is amazing, until you see the breadth of his knowledge, and the various products that he knows in deep technical detail.Indeed, he is the most technical ever manager I had in more than 21 years.Oh, and another bit of trivia that I heard from someone: S never missed a day at work in his 25 years of working there!