Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education

From	Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu>
Newsgroups	comp.lang.c
Subject	Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education
Date	2016-07-31 15:13 -0700
Organization	A noiseless patient Spider
Message-ID	<kfnwpk1lali.fsf@x-alumni2.alumni.caltech.edu> (permalink)
References	<nl966b$c57$1@dont-email.me> <MPG.32078f2c5e0554698a408@news.eternal-september.org> <kfninvlmw9b.fsf@x-alumni2.alumni.caltech.edu> <nnlopb$n8j$1@jstuckle.eternal-september.org>

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Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> writes:

> On 7/31/2016 3:40 PM, Tim Rentsch wrote:
>> "J. Clarke" <j.clarke.873638@gmail.com> writes:
>>
>>> In article <nl966b$c57$1@dont-email.me>, nospam@nspam.invalid says...
>>>
>>>>     I was told that DMR' thesis was in "recursive functions".  Now I've
>>>> always assumed maybe being wrong that back then this may have been a
>>>> mathematics recursive functions and he was a Mathematician.  Does anyone know
>>>> if his PhD was mathematics or computer science?
>>>>
>>>> Bill
>>>
>>> There's an interview that addresses this a little bit at
>>> <https://www.princeton.edu/~hos/mike/transcripts/ritchie.htm>.
>>>
>>> Remember, though, this was Harvard, where the computer as we know it was
>>> _invented_.  They were _doing_ what we now call "computer science" long
>>> before there was a name for it.
>>
>> I thought the computer as we know it was invented at the University
>> of Pennsylvania and the group at the Institute for Advanced Studies.
>> There were several precursors, including the Harvard Mark I, but
>> they are not computers as we know them today.  In particular, IIUC,
>> the Harvard Mark I was not Turing complete.
>>
>> I don't mean to trivialize the contribution of the group at Harvard,
>> which was substantial, but I don't think they invented the computer
>> as we know it today.  John von Neumann, who played a role in both
>> the UPenn and IAS groups, attributed the key concept to Turing's 1936
>> paper.  Note that Turing spent almost two years at Princeton right
>> around that time, next to von Neumann at the IAS.
>
> Actually, it was at Iowa State University -
> http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000984.htm.

I know about the Atanasoff effort.  It is one of the systems
referred to in the "several precursors" comment.  However, its
architecture is not like the architecture of computers as we
know them today.  In particular, like the Harvard Mark I, it
is not Turing complete;  nor did it implement a stored program
architecture.

Thread

Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education "J. Clarke" <j.clarke.873638@gmail.com> - 2016-07-31 05:30 -0400
  Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu> - 2016-07-31 12:40 -0700
    Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2016-07-31 16:58 -0400
      Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu> - 2016-07-31 15:13 -0700
        Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2016-07-31 21:21 -0400
          Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu> - 2016-08-01 08:12 -0700
      Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@cs.nmsu.edu> - 2016-07-31 16:41 -0600
        Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2016-07-31 21:24 -0400
          Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@cs.nmsu.edu> - 2016-07-31 22:15 -0600
            Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2016-08-01 09:38 -0400
              Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@cs.nmsu.edu> - 2016-08-01 10:18 -0600
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2016-08-01 16:22 -0400
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@cs.nmsu.edu> - 2016-08-01 15:05 -0600
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2016-08-04 14:01 -0400
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@cs.nmsu.edu> - 2016-08-04 12:22 -0600
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2016-08-04 16:47 -0400
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education "Osmium" <r124c4u102@comcast.net> - 2016-08-04 14:22 -0500
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2016-08-04 16:52 -0400
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education "Osmium" <r124c4u102@comcast.net> - 2016-08-04 16:10 -0500
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2016-08-04 20:30 -0400
    Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education luser droog <luser.droog@gmail.com> - 2016-07-31 18:20 -0700
    Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2016-08-01 19:52 +0100
      Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education supercat@casperkitty.com - 2016-08-01 15:25 -0700
        Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@cs.nmsu.edu> - 2016-08-01 16:38 -0600
          Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education supercat@casperkitty.com - 2016-08-01 15:56 -0700
            Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@cs.nmsu.edu> - 2016-08-01 17:41 -0600
            Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2016-08-02 06:22 +0100
      Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu> - 2016-08-01 16:48 -0700
        Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2016-08-02 06:27 +0100
          Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@cs.nmsu.edu> - 2016-08-02 08:42 -0600
            Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> - 2016-08-02 16:28 +0100
              Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Joe Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@cs.nmsu.edu> - 2016-08-02 11:15 -0600
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> - 2016-08-02 19:37 +0100
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education supercat@casperkitty.com - 2016-08-02 12:08 -0700
                Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> - 2016-08-02 22:40 +0100
          Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu> - 2016-08-03 06:57 -0700
          Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education "J. Clarke" <j.clarke.873638@gmail.com> - 2016-10-30 09:06 -0400
            Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education supercat@casperkitty.com - 2016-10-30 12:42 -0700
            Re: [OT] Denis Ritchie Education Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2016-10-31 18:12 +0000

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