Since we are about to end the month, we will again honor a person or individual who made a great impact on technology. This time, we will give tribute to a man who has given so much to the open source movement, particularly in the field of computer science.Some think of him as more important than Linus Torvalds or Richard M. Stallman. But others may have never heard about him, because he is not a typical celebrity or billionaire hacker. Although, wealthy and famous programmers who have already reached the pinnacle of success definitely have high respect for this man who’s name is Donald Knuth. He is our ‘Geek of the Month’, and we are going to present to you some interesting facts about his life, or rather his legend.
Donald Ervin Knuth was born on January 10, 1938, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Author of d applied his talents by constructing a formula for the value of each player. This novel approach was covered by Newsweek and by Walter Cronkite on the CBS television network.
While doing graduate studies, Knuth worked as a consultant, writing compilers for different computers. In 1963, he earned a Ph.D. in mathematics (advisor: Marshall Hall) from the California Institute of Technology, where he became a professor and began work on The Art of Computer Programming, originally planned to be a single book, and then planned as a six, and then seven-volume series. In 1968, he published the first volume.That same year, he joined the faculty of Stanford University.
In 1971, Knuth was the recipient of the first ACM Grace Murray Hopper Award. He has received various other awards including the Turing Award, the National Medal of Science, the John von Neumann Medal and the Kyoto Prize. After producing the third volume of his series in 1976, he expressed such frustration with the nascent state of the then newly developed electronic publishing tools (esp. those which provided input to phototypesetters) that he took time out to work on typesetting and created the TeX and METAFONT tools.
n recognition of Knuth's contributions to the field of computer science, in 1990 he was awarded the singular academic title of Professor of The Art of Computer Programming, which has since been revised to Professor Emeritus of The Art of Computer Programming.
In 1992 he became an associate of the French Academy of Sciences. Also that year, he retired from regular research and teaching at Stanford University in order to finish The Art of Computer Programming. In 2003 he was elected as a foreign member of the Royal Society. As of 2004, the first three volumes of his series have been re-issued, and Knuth is currently working on volume four, excerpts of which are released periodically on his website. Meanwhile, Knuth gives informal lectures a few times a year at Stanford University, which he calls Computer Musings. He is also a visiting professor at the Oxford University Computing Laboratory in the United Kingdom.
In addition to his writings on computer science, Knuth is also the author of 3:16 Bible Texts Illuminated (1991), ISBN 0-89579-252-4, in which he attempts to examine the Bible by a process of stratified sampling, namely an analysis of chapter 3, verse 16 of each book. Each verse is accompanied by a rendering in calligraphic art, contributed by a group of calligraphers under the leadership of Hermann Zapf.
He is also the author of Surreal Numbers (1974) ISBN 0-201-03812-9, a mathematical novelette on John Conway's set theory construction of an alternate system of numbers. Instead of simply explaining the subject, the book seeks to show the development of the mathematics. Knuth wanted the book to prepare students for doing original, creative research.
On January 1, 1990, Knuth announced to his colleagues that he would no longer have an email address, so that he may concentrate on his work. Knuth is a fan of Wikipedia, but he's a bit leery of the concept, saying that he would not want to have to remain forever on guard after making technically complex contributions, lest his comments be badly reedited.
Working Environment:
Knuth uses a regular Linux-based Intel computer for most of his work. He doesn't use fancy proprietary tools. He uses Emacs as an editor and Fvwm2 as a windows manager. His fascinating configuration can be found HERE:
Famous Quotes:
A list is only as strong as its weakest link.
An algorithm must be seen to be believed.
Any inaccuracies in this index may be explained by the fact that it has been sorted with the help of a computer.
Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it.
God is a challenge because there is no proof of his existence and therefore the search must continue.
I decry the current tendency to seek patents on algorithms. There are better ways to earn a living than to prevent other people from making use of one's contributions to computer science.
If you optimize everything, you will always be unhappy.
In fact what I would like to see is thousands of computer scientists let loose to do whatever they want. That's what really advances the field.
Let us change our traditional attitude to the construction of programs. Instead of imagining that our main task is to instruct a computer what to do, let us concentrate rather on explaining to human beings what we want a computer to do.
People think that computer science is the art of geniuses but the actual reality is the opposite, just many people doing things that build on eachother, like a wall of mini stones.
Science is what we understand well enough to explain to a computer. Art is everything else we do.
The hardest thing is to go to sleep at night, when there are so many urgent things needing to be done. A huge gap exists between what we know is possible with today's machines and what we have so far been able to finish.
The manuals we got from IBM would show examples of programs and I knew I could do a heck of a lot better than that. So I thought I might have some talent.
The most important thing in the kitchen is the waste paper basket and it needs to be centrally located.
The most important thing in the programming language is the name. A language will not succeed without a good name. I have recently invented a very good name and now I am looking for a suitable language.
There's ways to amuse yourself while doing things and thats how I look at efficiency.
Other Interesting Links:
* Donald Knuth's Stanford home page
* Donald Knuth: Leonard Euler of Computer Science (Softpanorama)
* The Potrzebie System of Weights and Measures
* Article about Knuth on www.stanfordalumni.org
Special Thanks to Wikipedia.org
