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Subject:
From:
Michael Feldman <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Michael Feldman <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Thu, 8 Aug 2002 11:08:33 -0400
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Hi all,

Thought you might be interested in reading this. As is hinted
below, Dijkstra is probably best known for a famous 1968 letter
to Communications of the ACM, about the "goto" statement in
programming. The letter was titled "GOTO Statement Considered
Harmful", and this title gave rise to all sorts of imitations
and parodies. Dijkstra never wrote that line - it was assigned
by the journal editor.

Dijkstra's most pertinent contributions to the Ada world were
in concurrent programming. He originated the "guarded command"
and nondeterministic selection, first published in CACM in 1975.
Its first (and nearly *only*) industrial-strength implementation
was in the Ada guarded select statement in tasking. Dijkstra
was no fan of Ada, but we tasking fans owe him a lot.

Dijkstra also originated the Dining Philosophers, again in CACM,
in 1971. I've heard him speak several times over the years. I can
attest that he had the same caustic wit in both English and Dutch.

RIP

Mike Feldman

Forwarded message:
> From [log in to unmask]  Thu Aug  8 10:49:18 2002
> Date: Thu, 08 Aug 2002 09:48:55 -0500
> From: James Caristi <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Edsger Dijkstra
> Sender: SIGCSE Member Forum <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Reply-to: James Caristi <[log in to unmask]>
> Message-id: <[log in to unmask]>
> X-NoFilter:  USER
>
> Professor Edsger Wybe Dijkstra, a noted pioneer of the science and
> industry of computing, died after a long struggle with cancer on 6 August
> 2002 at his home in Nuenen, the Netherlands.
>
> Dijkstra was born in 1930 in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, the son of a
> chemist father and a mathematician mother. He graduated from the
> Gymnasium Erasmianum in Rotterdam and obtained degrees in mathematics and
> theoretical physics from the University of Leyden and a Ph.D. in
> computing science from the University of Amsterdam. He worked as a
> programmer at the Mathematisch Centrum, Amsterdam, 1952-62; was professor
> of mathematics, Eindhoven University of Technology, 1962-1984; and was a
> Burroughs Corporation research fellow, 1973-1984. He held the
> Schlumberger Centennial Chair in Computing Sciences at the University of
> Texas at Austin, 1984-1999, and retired as Professor Emeritus in 1999.
>
> Dijkstra is survived by his wife of over forty years, Maria (Ria) C.
> Dijkstra Debets, by three children, Marcus J., Femke E., and computer
> scientist Rutger M. Dijkstra, and by two grandchildren.
>
> Dijkstra was the 1972 recipient of the ACM Turing Award, often viewed as
> the Nobel Prize for computing. He was a member of the Netherlands Royal
> Academy of Arts and Sciences, a member of the American Academy of Arts
> and Sciences, and a Distinguished Fellow of the British Computer Society.
> He received the 1974 AFIPS Harry Goode Award, the 1982 IEEE Computer
> Pioneer Award, and the 1989 ACM SIGCSE Award for Outstanding
> Contributions to Computer Science Education. Athens University of
> Economics awarded him an honorary doctorate in 2001. In 2002, the C&C
> Foundation of Japan recognized Dijkstra "for his pioneering contributions
> to the establishment of the scientific basis for computer software
> through creative research in basic software theory, algorithm theory,
> structured programming, and semaphores".
>
> Dijkstra is renowned for the insight that mathematical logic is and must
> be the basis for sensible computer program construction and for his
> contributions to mathematical methodology. He is responsible for the idea
> of building operating systems as explicitly synchronized sequential
> processes, for the formal development of computer programs, and for the
> intellectual foundations for the disciplined control of nondeterminacy.
> He is well known for his amazingly efficient shortest path algorithm and
> for having designed and coded the first Algol 60 compiler. He was
> famously the leader in the abolition of the GOTO statement from
> programming.
>
> Dijkstra was a prodigious writer. His entire collection of over thirteen
> hundred written works was digitally scanned and is accessible at
> http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD. He also corresponded regularly with
> hundreds of friends and colleagues over the years --not by email but by
> conventional post. He strenuously preferred the fountain pen to the
> computer in producing his scholarly output and letters.
>
> Dijkstra was notorious for his wit, eloquence, and way with words, such
> as in his remark "The question of whether computers can think is like the
> question of whether submarines can swim"; his advice to a promising
> researcher, who asked how to select a topic for research: "Do only what
> only you can do"; and his remark in his Turing Award lecture "In their
> capacity as a tool, computers will be but a ripple on the surface of our
> culture. In their capacity as intellectual challenge, they are without
> precedent in the cultural history of mankind."
>
> Dijkstra enriched the language of computing with many concepts and
> phrases, such as structured programming, separation of concerns,
> synchronization, deadly embrace, dining philosophers, weakest
> precondition, guarded command, the excluded miracle, and the famous
> "semaphores" for controlling computer processes. The Oxford English
> Dictionary cites his use of the words "vector" and "stack" in a computing
> context.
>
> Dijkstra enjoyed playing Mozart for his friends on his Boesendorfer
> piano. He and his wife had a fondness for exploring state and national
> parks in their Volkswagen bus, dubbed the Touring Machine, in which he
> wrote many technical papers.
>
> Throughout his scientific career, Dijkstra formulated and pursued the
> highest academic ideals of scientific rigour untainted by commercial,
> managerial, or political considerations. Simplicity, beauty, and
> eloquence were his hallmarks, and his uncompromising insistence on
> elegance in programming and mathematics was an inspiration to thousands.
> He judged his own work by the highest standards and set a continuing
> challenge to his many friends to do the same. For the rest, he willingly
> undertook the role of Socrates, that of a gadfly to society, repeatedly
> goading his native and his adoptive country by remarking on the mistakes
> inherent in fashionable ideas and the dangers of time-serving
> compromises. Like Socrates, his most significant legacy is to those who
> engaged with him in small group discussions or scientific correspondence
> about half-formulated ideas and emerging discoveries. Particularly
> privileged are those who attended his reading groups in Eindhoven and
> Austin, known as the "Tuesday Afternoon Clubs".
>
> At Dijkstra's passage, let us recall Phaedo's parting remark about
> Socrates: "we may truly say that of all the men of his time whom we have
> known, he was the wisest and justest and best."
>

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