Pioneers of Computing

Virtual Library

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VMoC

This exhibit provides links to "home" pages or other resources on people, both alive and dead, who have made a significant impact on computing.

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Robin Milner↑ (1934-2010), pioneer of automated theorem proving, programming language design, and concurrent systems, died on 20th March 2010.

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Selected pioneers

• David Wheeler (1927-2004), inventor of the closed subroutine, died on 13 December 2004.

• Edgar (Ted) Codd (1923-2003), inventor of the relational database model, died on 18 April 2003.

• Roger Needham (1935-2003), Director of Microsoft Research Cambridge, died on 28 February 2003.

• Edsger Wybe Dijkstra (1930-2002), advocator of structured programming, died on 6 August 2002. See obiturary.

• Both co-inventors of Simula 67, the first object-oriented programming language, died in 2002.
  Ole-Johan Dahl (1931-2002) died on 29 June 2002.
  Kristen Nygaard (1926-2002) died on 10 August 2002.

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List of pioneers

1. Howard H. Aiken (Havard Mark I)
2. Marc Andreessen (Netscape)
3. John V. Atanasoff
4. Boris A. Babaian (Russian supercomputers)
5. Charles Babbage (Analytical Engine)
6. Charles W. Bachman (databases)
7. John Backus (BNF)
8. Gordon Bell (Digital)
9. Tim Berners-Lee (WWW)
10. Fred Brooks
11. Vannevar Bush
12. David Caminer (LEO)
13. Vinton Cerf (Internet)
14. James Clark (Silicon Graphics and Netscape)
15. Edgar F. Codd (databases)
16. Seymour Cray (supercomputers)
17. Ole-Johan Dahl (Simula)
18. Donald Davies (packet switching)
19. Edsger W. Dijkstra
20. John Presper Eckert (see also here)
21. Lawrence Ellison (Oracle)
22. Douglas C. Engelbart (the mouse!)
23. Andrei P. Ershov (theroretical programming)
24. Edward A. Feigenbaum (AI)
25. Tommy Flowers (Colossus engineer)
26. Robert W. Floyd
27. Thomas Fowler (ternary calculator)
28. Bill Gates (see also interview and unofficial information)
29. Kurt Gödel
30. Richard W. Hamming
31. Jacques Herbrand
32. William R. Hewlett
33. C. A. R. Hoare (CSP)
34. Marcian E. Hoff Jr
35. Herman Hollerith
36. Grace M. Hopper (see also here)
37. Harry D. Huskey (computer designer)
38. Kenneth E. Iverson (APL)
39. Steve Jobs (Apple and Next)
40. Tom Kilburn (Manchester)
41. Donald E. Knuth (TeX)
42. Peter Landin
43. Sergei A. Lebedev (MESM computer, Ukraine)
44. Augusta Ada Lovelace
45. Carver Mead
46. John McCarthy (AI)
47. Benoit Mandelbrot
48. John W. Mauchly
49. Robin Milner (LCF, ML and CCS)
50. Harlan Mills
51. Marvin Minsky
52. Charles E. Molnar
53. Roger Needham
54. Nicholas Negroponte
55. Ted Nelson (hypertext)
56. Kristen Nygaard
57. Ken Olsen
58. David Packard
59. David Parnas (software engineering)
60. Blaise Pascal
61. John Pinkerton (LEO)
62. Jon Postel (Internet)
63. Dennis M. Ritchie (Unix)
64. P. Georg and Edvard Scheutz (Difference Engine, Sweden)
65. Claude E. Shannon (information theory)
66. Sir Clive Sinclair (personal computers)
67. George R. Stibitz
68. Christopher Strachey (denotational semantics)
69. Ivan E. Sutherland (graphics)
70. Ken Thompson (Unix)
71. Michael Tomczyk (home computers)
72. Linus Torvalds , Richard Stallman (GNU/Linux)
73. Alan M. Turing (Colossus and code-breaking)
74. John von Neumann (see also here)
75. An Wang
76. David Wheeler (closed subroutines)
77. Maurice V. Wilkes (EDSAC, macros, microprogramming)
78. J.H. Wilkinson (numerical analysis)
79. Freddie C. Williams
80. Niklaus Wirth
81. Stephen Wolfram (Mathematica)
82. Steve Wozniak (1996 Kilby Laureate, Apple)
83. Konrad Zuse (see also here)

See also

• Computer pioneers listed in Wikipedia (an excellent resource!).
• Hall of Fellows from the Computer History Museum.
• People and pioneers from The History of Computing and the book Computer Pioneers by Prof. John A. N. Lee.
• Computers and Internet:History:People from Yahoo.
• Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing.
• Index of Inventors from the US National Inventors Hall of Fame, including:
  • Bardeen, Shockley and Brattain (Semiconductor amplifier; Three-electrode circuit element utilizing semiconductive materials)
  • Herman Hollerith (Art of Compiling Statistics; Apparatus for Compiling Statistics).
  • Kenneth H. Olsen (Magnetic Core Memory).
  • George R. Stibitz (Complex Computer).
  • An Wang (Pulse Transfer Controlling Device).
• Computer Pioneer Awards recipients, 50th anniversary awards list and other awards from the IEEE Computer Society.
• A.M.Turing Award recipients, Fellows, other award winners and 50th Anniversary Committee from the ACM.
• Computer inventors and pioneers from Computer Hope .
• Invention Dimension, American inventors archives, also including many computer pioneers.
• Biographies of mathematicians, especially in the 20th century from the highly recommended MacTutor History of Mathematics archive.
• People involved with Manchester computing.
• Biographies of computer pioneers (A-J) and (K-Z). Very comprehensive, from the History of Computing Project.
• Internet Pioneers.
• Famous Computer Scientists voting results from Roger Boyle.

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Please contact Jonathan Bowen if you know of relevant or better WWW home pages not included here, especial names listed without a link.

Last updated 19 June 2009.