[clug] Re: Who's famous in the 80's and 2000's? (Sakari Mattila)

Michael Kenneth Simpson mksimpson at velocitynet.com.au
Mon Jan 12 03:46:16 GMT 2009


     Konrad Zuse is credited with building the first stored-program
computer, out of surplus post-office relays in the living room of his
parents' flat around the beginning of ww2.  He also developed a
programming language called plankalkul, I believe, but I don't think
his work was known to any of the pioneers of the 40's and 50's.  It
was also largely ignored by the nazis.  Werner von Braun supposedly
didn't think it would be of much use in developing rockets.

     The author of the seminal 'Structured Progamming' was Edsgar Dykstra.
 Pascal was developed by Niklaus Wirth.  I think Algol actually
predates the formal structured programming school, and I don't know
any names associated with it off hand, except Algol-W, which was
Wirth again.

>
> Gordon Bell (DEC) was big name for 1960-1980s, peaking in 1970s. DEC
> made computers
> available to universities and on-line real-time process users. There is
> one DEC veteran
> in Canberra, Penny Collings at UC.
>
> Konrad Zuse was a forerunner 1930-1960s with hardware and software. If I
> haven't
> badly misunderstood, he started structured languages in the series Algol
> - Pascal - Java.
> Zuse's computers used conditional substitution, not branching, and were
> labeled as
> non-computers until 1990s.
>
> UK digital systems (crypto and telephony) people in 1940s, mainly WWII,
> should have
> their place in the history. Building hardware and programming was then a
> mixed business.
>
> Donald Knuth wrote his main books in early 1970s, never finished the
> eight volume
> series - three parts are available, fourth is known to exists as a
> draft, but not in book form.
>
> Teuvo Kohonen (Helsinki University of Technology, now Aalto University)
> contributed
> quite a lot in artificial neural networks and self learning systems,
> thus taking computers
> out of rigid pre-programmed domain.
>
> Early microcomputer people in USA 1970s and 1980s, Tiny Basic, CP/M,
> FORTH, etc.
> very innovative things. Also 1970s a professor in Norway, who designed
> first object-oriented
> programming language.
>
> Maybe a few more later, if I find my old memories hat.
>
> --
> Sakari Mattila
> LPO Box 5080
> Canberra Univ. ACT 2617
> +61408533474 (SMS)
> fname.sname at gmail.com
>
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Message: 1
>> Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2009 16:28:46 +1100
>> From: steve jenkin <sjenkin at canb.auug.org.au>
>> Subject: [clug] Who's famous in the 80's and 2000's?
>> To: CLUG List <linux at lists.samba.org>
>> Message-ID: <4969838E.4060703 at canb.auug.org.au>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>>
>> Today I was trying to think of the 'leading lights' in computing for
>> each of the decades its been around.
>>
>> I struck a blank for the 1980's and post 2000.
>>
>> Anyone got their favourites or suggestions?
>>
>> This was my quick hack list :-)
>> Any other suggestions happily accepted, but if you mention your
>> criteria
>> or the persons' field, that'd be nice.
>>
>> 1930 - 1950 Turing, von Neuman, ...
>> 1950 - 1960 Bob Glass, Jerry Weinberg, ...
>> 1960 - 1970 Ritchie & Thompson, Codd & Date
>> 1970 - 1980 BSD guys, Bill Joy, Gates, Steve Jobs
>> 1980 - 1990 ???
>> 1990 - 2000 Linus & Tridge
>> 2000 - 2010 ???
>>
>> cheers
>> steve
>> --
>> Steve Jenkin, Info Tech, Systems and Design Specialist.
>> 0412 786 915 (+61 412 786 915)
>> PO Box 48, Kippax ACT 2615, AUSTRALIA
>>
>> sjenkin at canb.auug.org.au http://members.tip.net.au/~sjenkin
>> ------------------------------
>
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Michael Simpson



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