Edsger Wybe Dijsktra, Professor Emiretus Department of Computer Science, University of Texas. Working in his small office with a few close scholars he solved problems of great importance which shaped development of computer science as a respectable scientific discipline. He was born to a chemist father and a mathematician mother. His mother was a lasting influence on his approach to mathematics and his emphasis on elegance. Those days computers were a novelty and he happened to be a programmer by accident. A. van Wijngaarden, the then director of the Computation Department at the Mathematical Center in Amsterdam offered him a job, which he accepted becoming Netherlands’ first official programmer. When Dijkstra married Maria (Ria) C. Debets in 1957, he was required as a part of the marriage rites to state his profession. He stated that he was a programmer, which was unacceptable to the authorities, there being no such profession at that time in The Netherlands. And, believe it or not, but under the heading "profession" his marriage act shows the ridiculous entry "theoretical physicist"!
He was a towering figure in the field of computer science. Among his contributions to computer science is the shortest path-algorithm, also known as Dijkstra's algorithm; Reverse Polish Notation and related Shunting yard algorithm; the THE multiprogramming system; Banker's algorithm; and the semaphore construct for coordinating multiple processors and programs. Another concept due to Dijkstra in the field of distributed computing is that of self-stabilization – an alternative way to ensure the reliability of the system. Dijkstra's algorithm is used in SPF, Shortest Path First, which is used in the routing protocol OSPF, Open Shortest Path First.
He is also known for his famous paper ‘A case against the GOTO statement’ criticizing Goto statement, which led to wide deprecation of use of Goto and development of control structures such as while loop. This methodology of programming was known as Structured Programming.
Simplicity, beauty and eloquence in programming were his hallmarks and through these he inspired several budding programmers. As he stated himself once “If you want more effective programmers, you will discover that they should not waste their time debugging, they should not introduce the bugs to start with”
Dijkstra always believed it a scientist's duty to maintain a lively correspondence with his scientific colleagues. For over four decades, he mailed copies of his consecutively numbered technical notes, trip reports, insightful observations, and pungent commentaries, known collectively as "EWDs", to several dozen recipients in academia and industry.
In 1972, Dijkstra received the Turing Award, known as the Nobel prize of computing, for his major contributions to the development in the late 1950's of ALGOL, a high level programming language, which became a model of clarity and mathematical rigor. His acceptance speech for this award, titled the “The humble programmer”, includes a vast number of observations on the evolution of programming as a discipline and prescriptions for its continued growth; it is must reading for any aspiring computer scientist.
Let’s conclude on a lighter note with an excerpt from Dijkstra’s speech in which he talks about the condition of the poor programmer:
He was a towering figure in the field of computer science. Among his contributions to computer science is the shortest path-algorithm, also known as Dijkstra's algorithm; Reverse Polish Notation and related Shunting yard algorithm; the THE multiprogramming system; Banker's algorithm; and the semaphore construct for coordinating multiple processors and programs. Another concept due to Dijkstra in the field of distributed computing is that of self-stabilization – an alternative way to ensure the reliability of the system. Dijkstra's algorithm is used in SPF, Shortest Path First, which is used in the routing protocol OSPF, Open Shortest Path First.
He is also known for his famous paper ‘A case against the GOTO statement’ criticizing Goto statement, which led to wide deprecation of use of Goto and development of control structures such as while loop. This methodology of programming was known as Structured Programming.
Simplicity, beauty and eloquence in programming were his hallmarks and through these he inspired several budding programmers. As he stated himself once “If you want more effective programmers, you will discover that they should not waste their time debugging, they should not introduce the bugs to start with”
Dijkstra always believed it a scientist's duty to maintain a lively correspondence with his scientific colleagues. For over four decades, he mailed copies of his consecutively numbered technical notes, trip reports, insightful observations, and pungent commentaries, known collectively as "EWDs", to several dozen recipients in academia and industry.
In 1972, Dijkstra received the Turing Award, known as the Nobel prize of computing, for his major contributions to the development in the late 1950's of ALGOL, a high level programming language, which became a model of clarity and mathematical rigor. His acceptance speech for this award, titled the “The humble programmer”, includes a vast number of observations on the evolution of programming as a discipline and prescriptions for its continued growth; it is must reading for any aspiring computer scientist.
Let’s conclude on a lighter note with an excerpt from Dijkstra’s speech in which he talks about the condition of the poor programmer:
“What about the poor programmer? Well, to tell the honest truth: he was hardly noticed. For one thing, the first machines were so bulky that you could hardly move them. Secondly, his somewhat invisible work was without any glamour: you could show the machine to visitors and that was several orders of magnitude more spectacular than some sheets of coding.”
Comments
Post a Comment