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Much thanks to Dzonatas. This section needed to be broken out from the main Computer Science topic. -- Somewherepurple
I instituted a merge, but I'm not familiar enough with these people: J.C.R. Licklider, Jay Forrester, Norbert Wiener, Vannevar Bush to add them into the table correctly. I hope someone gets to that sometime. Radagast83 05:53, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
http://www.ibiblio.org/pioneers/
Cheers! - Shadowfax0 ( talk) 02:03, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
I think Ivan Sutherland should be added (Known for Sketchpad, considered by many to be the creator of Computer Graphics) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Sutherland —Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.67.87.133 ( talk) 04:02, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
I think an external link to the CHM is germane. It's a non-profit 501(c)(3) org, covering the subject of this Wikipedia article. Board of Trustees looks reputable. Any opinions that say the CHM should not be linked in? -- Iterator12n Talk 22:57, 15 August 2008 (UTC)
What a good system to be able to click on a button to re-order the entries in the table.-- TedColes ( talk) 11:48, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Names I would like to suggest to discuss for inclusion in 'computer pioneers'.
Charles Babbage originated the concept of a digital programmable computer, the analytical engine in 1837.
Ada Lovelace regarded as the first to recognise the full potential of Charles Babbage's analytical engine and the first computer programmer for the work done crating the first program intended to execute on the analytical engine.
Jay W. Forrester coincident-current magnetic core memory, project leader of Whirlwind
Freddie Williams and Tom Kilburn " Williams tube" memory
Dudley Allen Buck inventor of cryotron, content addressable memory, Ferroelectric ram (see my talk page re: my interest in this subject)
Marcian Hoff Intel 4004 Federico Faggin Intel 4004 (leader of intel 4004 project) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.173.127.190 ( talk) 16:14, 18 September 2018 (UTC)
Ken Olsen co-founder Digital Equipment Corp., key person in development of TX-0 computer
James Reid Anderson - co-inventor of the acoustic coupler; founder of Information Terminals, which would be renamed Verbatim disk drive manufacturer;
If anyone knows who to credit for development / perfection of magnetic-drum memory and/or magnetic tape memory, that name might be appropriate for inclusion on this page.
Eccles and Jordan for the Eccles-Jordan flip-flop.
Harry Huskey Standards Western Automatic Computer
Tony Li and Yakov Rekhte, who developed the spec for Border Gateway Protocol, which allows carriers to exchange routes inside their networks and with each-other, allowing the internet to scale infinitely. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mefirefoxes ( talk • contribs) 03:47, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
AlanDewey ( talk) 16:20, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
What about Edward Feigenbaum ?! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 3omarz ( talk • contribs) 17:50, 8 December 2011 (UTC)
This article is biased towards mathematics, algorithms applied in software and the computing machines that run them. But core hardware component inventions and advancements are arguably as necessary to advancements in computer science. Please consider contributors such as William Shockley (Semiconductors), Robert Noyce (et al Phd's) @ Fairchild (IC) & with Ted Hoff (Microprocessor), & with Gordon Moore (Memory), and whomever is responsible for flash memory. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.198.107.11 ( talk) 17:11, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
Does Charles Moore (inventor of FORTH) qualify as a pioneer? Handyandy802 ( talk) 13:41, 14 July 2019 (UTC)
Philo Farnsworth and/or his Russian and/or Scottish competitor? Farnsworth himself advanced technology that was called "TV" for a while and predicted HD resolutions as high as "2000 lines" in 1954 — Preceding unsigned comment added by StinkPickle4000 ( talk • contribs) 02:48, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
John Carmack for innovations in 3-D computer graphics and novel algorithm application in video game design.
John Boyer for advancements in accessibility — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.48.240.237 ( talk) 04:57, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
Marvin Minski was born in 1927, not much of an achievement. I changed Minski's date to the founding of the AI Lab/Project MAC, which is what the table mentions. Likewise, George Boole was fifteen years old in 1830. I changed the date to the publication dates of his works on logic. 75.15.115.245 ( talk) 17:33, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
Shouldn't Bill Gates be on this list? 74.178.186.35 ( talk) 02:08, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
I'm not sure that Bryan Cantrill should be on this list; I don't believe that DTrace is as notable/important to computer science as the rest of the achievements listed. I'm removing him from the list. Blelbach ( talk) 05:06, 15 December 2012 (UTC)
I don't think that al-Khwārizmī qualifies as a pioneer in computer science. Computer science relies on a number of earlier developments and isn't alone in using algorithms. -- TedColes ( talk) 10:49, 27 February 2014 (UTC)
I suggest adding the following people to the list:
Gordon E. Moore developed Moore's Law which empirically showed the increasing speed of computation technology (1965)
Rolf Landauer derived Landauer's principle, giving the thermodynamic limitations of computing systems (1961)
Gene Amdahl developed parallel scaling and Amdahl's law which shows the practical limits of parallelizing a given problem (1967)
John L. Gustafson developed weak scaling and Gustafson's law which helped to precipitate the parallel supercomputing revolution (1988)
— Rememberlands ( talk) 18:18, 11 February 2015 (UTC)
Isn't is a pity that the inventor of the first working general programmable computer ( Konrad Zuse) is last in the table?
I would like to see the table by default sorted in timeline order. Schily ( talk) 12:44, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
It currently reads
The term "algorithm" is derived from the algorism, the technique of performing arithmetic with Hindu-Arabic numerals developed by al-Khwarizmi. Both "algorithm" and "algorism" are derived from the Latinized forms of al-Khwarizmi's name, Algoritmi and Algorismi, respectively. His Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing (Arabic: الكتاب المختصر في حساب الجبر والمقابلة al-Kitāb al-mukhtaṣar fī ḥisāb al-jabr wal-muqābala) is a mathematical book written approximately 830 CE. The word Algebra is also derived from the title of his book and it is believed to be the first book on the subject. The notion of zero is found for the first time in this book. However, it is believed he had learned the notion of zero from Indians through his travels to India. With zero, he was able to invent the systematic Indo-Arabic number (decimal) system. The word algorithm was given in Europe to a method he called "Attarigolkharazmi" (Akharazmi's Method) for taking square root of whole numbers in decimal system. The method is based on first identity ((a+b)^2 = a^2 + b^2, where a= 10^n, n>1). The word "method" was dropped in time and the word algorithm referred to this method of taking square root. As more elaborate ways of doing complex things, in a mechanized way, through mathematical reasoning were discovered/invented, they were all called algorithms. Certain algorithms, such as deriving the greatest common divisor existed way before Alkharazmi (Greek time). However, Europeans were so impressed by Kharazmi's method that his name replaced the world "method".
I addition to being inordinately long, I think it has some errors. That "identity" is false, as a=100, b=2 gives (100+2)^2 = (102)^2 = 1040 while 100^2 + 2^2 = 1004. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.236.221.138 ( talk) 14:55, 12 October 2016 (UTC)
Sure she is accomplished but she is NOT a pioneer in computer science. 152.131.14.9 ( talk) 14:56, 5 April 2017 (UTC)
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I've noticed that one user has added significant changes ( https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=List_of_pioneers_in_computer_science&type=revision&diff=803332873&oldid=799334223) for a lot of achievements that aren't noteworthy in my opinion. Most of them read in the form, the "The first X to do Y", where Y is something that a lot of people have achieved before. A common example is "The first female engineer to do ...". While those achievements are important in their own right, I don't think that makes them pioneers in computer science in general, although some of those in that list might be.
An example of an entry which I think shouldn't be here: "Named third (and first female) Chief Technology Officer of the United States of America (USCTO), succeeding Todd Park."
Just to be clear, I have nothing against entries with women such as Ada Lovelace, as most people that have studied computer science are likely to have heard about.
TLDR: Undo those changes? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gajop ( talk • contribs) 05:38, 13 October 2017 (UTC)
I'm not sure if several recent additions meet the criterium at the top of the article. "This article presents a list of individuals who helped in the creation, development and imagining of what computers and electronics could do." For instance, does this apply to all six original programmers of the ENIAC? For instance, none of them have an entry in Milestones in Computer Science and Information Technology by Edward Reilly. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 18:02, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
Exciting inventions, innovative technology, human interaction, and intriguing politics fill computing history. However, the recorded history is mainly composed of male achievements and involvements, even though women have played substantial roles. This situation is not unusual. Most science fields are notorious for excluding, undervaluing, or overlooking the accomplishments of their female scientists [1, 16, 17, 22]. As J.A.N. Lee points out, it is up to the historians and others to remedy this imbalance...
— Denise Gürer [1]
References
I am under the impression that in the last few years somebody added a long string of names, largely irrelevant to computer science, which hold the sole distinction of being female: https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=List_of_pioneers_in_computer_science&type=revision&diff=805664510&oldid=390493835
Consider for example Marissa Mayer, who "was the first female engineer hired at Google", or Maria Klawe who "was the first woman to become President of the Harvey Mudd College since its founding in 1955", or Megan Smith, "named third USCTO [...] succeeding Todd Park".
They might be scientists, I have my doubts they are distinguished scientists and I am fairly certain they are not pioneers of computer science.
I recommend reverting these changes, as they can only damage the credibility of women in science.
Start, instead, with real pioneers in computer science, like /info/en/?search=Radhia_Cousot, who single-handedly invented abstract interpretation together with Patrick Cousot (over 6000 citations for https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=512973), or Hanne Riis Nielson ( https://scholar.google.it/citations?user=5U0XVHUAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao), or Mariangiola Dezani-Ciancaglini (a student of Corrado Bohem), or ...
Thanks MrFlowerpot ( talk) 21:04, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
The consensus is no in response to the question
does achievement in the field that is notable partly or primarily due to the overcoming of social barriers present within the field, constitute grounds for inclusion in the list?. The consensus is an individual should be included on the list only based on pioneering technical work in the field of computer science.Some editors suggested creating a List of social pioneers in science and technology or <demographic> pioneers in computer science for people who overcame social barriers in the field.
The editors of this page are not entirely in agreement about which people are eligible for inclusion in the list, and request community input. In particular, does achievement in the field that is notable partly or primarily due to the overcoming of social barriers present within the field, constitute grounds for inclusion in the list? Zazpot ( talk) 13:21, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
User Zazpot has undone my removal of Evelyn Boyd Granville and promised references: https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=List_of_pioneers_in_computer_science&oldid=807012207
Copious references for the table entry did come in a timely fashion, but the problem is with the copy itself, not with the lack of references:
"Was the second African-American woman in the U.S. to receive a PhD in mathematics.[4][5][6][7] From 1956 to 1960, she worked for IBM on the Project Vanguard and Project Mercury space programs, developing computer software for analyzing orbits, and continued to work in computer programming, applied mathematics, and mathematical education throughout her career."
This reads as "Granville was an applied mathematician/physicist", not a computer scientist.
"We had a computer in our lab so I was among its 30 users" does not constitute engaging in computer science.
Frankly, this is getting really crazy and I'm doubting of either the sanity of who is contributing to this page or their background in computer science.
As a side note, I believe insistence on an obscure person of African heritage shows a distinctly American-centric view, which seems rather un-NPOV to me (the ongoing oppression of black people in America is a purely American concern).
In fact, if we wanted to really include all possible instantiations of "the first X who did Y", at the very least we would need to add all the Soviet mathematicians and engineers of the era, then, and the Chinese scientists who designed their own computers in the 1960s and 1970s (plenty of interesting folklore: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/1658660/), and so on, possibly down to the first telegraph operator in Mozambique.
MrFlowerpot ( talk) 21:03, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
References
@ Zazpot: - I'd love to hear your explanation for the relevant of Janese Swanson, Carla Meninsky, and Roberta Williams to this list. While generating computer game content with a LFSR is a nice trick, use of such generation techniques is not groundbreaking (e.g. the predating Rogue (video game)) - and is definitely not pioneering in computer science. Being a professional in computing tagged a pioneer by someone does not a pioneer in computer science make. Icewhiz ( talk) 15:30, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
I think this article should include people who have made significant pioneering contributions to computer science, by the judgement of their peers. That would include recipients of:
and maybe others, although the Hopper award is a little limited because it considers the age of the person. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 05:02, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
I removed several individuals with little claim for pioneering in CS from the list. I also tagged Karen Spärck Jones, Barbara J. Grosz, Betty Holberton, Jean E. Sammet, and Rosalind Picard as WP:UNDUE. All are notable professionals and academics with some significant contributions and 2nd/3rd tier awards, however it is unclear to me that they meet a pioneering in CS threshold for inclusion here and I would appreciate additional input. Icewhiz ( talk) 09:01, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
Under See Also, I added a link to the relevant IEEE Computer Pioneer Award. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 19:13, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
So, if I understand correctly, user Zazpot's 10 day long tantrum is culminating with the claim that there is a male/western "systemic bias" ( https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=List_of_pioneers_in_computer_science&oldid=808087384), which if I understand correctly is something "created by the shared social and cultural characteristics of most editors" ( /info/en/?search=Wikipedia:Systemic_bias).
This comes after two or three pages of discussion have been spent in which more or less everybody has kept suggesting that individuals of female gender with no achievement whatsoever on the list (e.g. graphic designers, cabinet ministers...) be replaced with Turing prize and EATCS Award winners of compatible gender. It is also my impression that the user in question has kept a steadfast opposition with increasingly byzantine reasoning.
In case the reader's wits are particularly slow, I'll sum it up as follows: everyone but Zazpot wants to improve representation of women as well as non-American scientists on this list in terms of both quality and quantity.
If I am to loosely translate a saying from my native land, I'd say this amounts to "pissing on the roses and blaming the wolf for it".
I suppose the call for deletion also show's the user's willingness to "cut the baby in half" (as in /info/en/?search=Judgment_of_Solomon) when faced with the impossibility of controlling the page's content.
I see the following possible explanations for this:
As I've stated otherwise, in a strictly game-theoretic sense, as a white male computer scientist ("aaargh, cis scum!") I benefit from this user's efforts in lowering the quality of Wikipedia as a whole and in misrepresenting both computer science and women's contributions to it, as this both appreciates my degree, my accumulated knowledge and my Y chromosome.
Everybody, have fun with this, life is frankly too short for spending days in working against those who are unwittingly trying to maximize your utility. Sir or Madam, please continue working for my benefit.
This will be my last post at least until sanity is re-established (last but not least because I'm likely going to get banned - pity, I registered because I was trying to do a public service, but I see bullies are privileged around here). — Preceding unsigned comment added by MrFlowerpot ( talk • contribs) 21:50, 31 October 2017 (UTC) — MrFlowerpot ( talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
yes, many of these comments reek of systemic white male bias.Many of you should be ashamed of yourselves. User:Zazpot, I thank you for your efforts in this matter. Deletion and general lack of representation of women (and non-white, and non-western people) is a serious problem on WP, The Guardian even has a whole article on it, not that the people who need to read it will :-/ See also Women_in_science#Social.2C_historical_and_critical_studies. SemanticMantis ( talk) 16:29, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
Deletion is not the answer; let's work out some criteria. It seems to me that sensible criteria would remove some of the males, and perhaps help us be more fair to the females and others. Like why are Shima and Tukey here? Chip layout and FFT are not computer science, imho. But if the criterion includes Fellows of the Computer History Museum, then Shima is in. Tukey, still not, even though he was a great pioneer in statistics and such (OK, maybe I'm wrong about him; his article says he came up with the term "bit"; but not for FFT). Dicklyon ( talk) 16:32, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
what do we mean by "pioneers"?Meters ( talk) 04:55, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
Wikipedia does not publish original research. Its content is determined by previously published information rather than the beliefs or experiences of its editors.
"We should formulate" what "we mean by pioneers" is WP:NOR.") - is NOT WP:OR. To the contrary, it is accepted practice in Wikipedia to set inclusion criteria. See WP:LISTV#INC and WP:LEADFORALIST. Setting criteria is exactly what editors do. Note that Wikipedia:Lists in Wikipedia#Lists should generally only represent consensus opinion runs contrary to some of your edits (which were based on a single (or few) source(s) (sometimes RS, sometimes iffy) saying X was a pioneer (of computing? Of first X of type Y to do Z in computing? Both flew)). Icewhiz ( talk) 14:31, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
[Be] aware of original research when selecting the criteria for inclusion: use a criterion that is widely agreed upon rather than inventing new criteria that cannot be verified as notable or that is not widely accepted.
It should not be asserted that the most popular view or some sort of intermediate view among the different views is the correct one.
"unambiguous, objective, and supported by reliable sources.") is an editorial decision. Icewhiz ( talk) 15:44, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
I've ordered the book The Computer Pioneers: The Making of the Modern Computer. It was published in 1986, but it should be a good reference for pioneers. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 17:25, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
Page 206 of the book lists these people as the main ones to get computing into the electronic era: JP Eckert, W Eckert, J Mauchly, J Brainerd, J Atanasoff, C Berry, K Zuse, G Stibitz, J von Neumann, T Flowers, A Coombs, IJ Good, A Turing, H Aiken, V Bush, G Hopper, N Wiener, O Velben, and DH Lehmer. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 01:10, 10 November 2017 (UTC)
I have nominated this page for deletion on the basis that a list of this type is inherently WP:OR. The fact that a debate is going on here about the merit of various computer scientists is, in my mind, a great reason for the existence of the WP:OR policy. CapitalSasha ~ talk 06:30, 9 November 2017 (UTC)
Would this list be more informative if items were listed chronologically? One point in favor of it is that readers would then be able to trace the history of the innovations while at the same time familiarizing themselves with the individuals. Or maybe a separate alphabetical list of names-only after the chart. Randy Kryn ( talk) 06:13, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
I cannot take the page seriously when it starts jumping from year 830 directly to 1944. Bohan ( talk) 16:38, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
I removed this section from the table (more correctly, commented it out):
|- | 2007 | [[Nick McKeown]], Scott Shenkar, Martin Casado | Created [[Software Defined Networking]]
I'm not sure if it was inadvertently added or added as a joke. If it was genuinely added then I think it should be discussed first since there does not appear to be anything pioneering "XXX as a service", with XXX=Networking. I also fear it will lead to additional taint, like including Software Defined Radios or Cloud Computing as pioneering milestones. Jeffrey Walton ( talk) 14:10, 3 October 2018 (UTC)
This list still has problems; it's too long, and includes too many people who did not have a significant impact.
First, the title of the list ('pioneers in computer science') would to my mind mostly rule out anyone before the 1930s (modulo Babbage, Lovelace and a few others) since none of them really had a significant CS impact.
Another big one is a seeming attempt to add more women just to... have more women in the list. This has produced such absurdities as listing Elizabeth Feinler and not Jon Postel (Jake is a wonderful person, but her accomplishments don't, I think, merit inclusion on this list, whereas Jon's might); listing Sally Floyd, but not Van Jacobson (although Van did important stuff, but not to the point of being worthy of being in this list), etc. (If you don't understand why I have paired them, you need to study them, and what they worked on, a bit more.) There are women who absolutely belong (starting with Grace Hopper and Lynn Conway, although it's not clear which class to credit the latter to), but trying to add women just to have more females is just as pernicious as adding (or removing) people because of their skin colour. Historical/etc circumstances have left an un-balanced list, but... it is what it is. What's next, adding more female musicians to a list of jazz greats to make it more balanced? (To show just how pernicious balancing can be, how about adding more white musicians? Nonsense, of course.)
And several notable names that IMO are missing: Christopher Strachey, Jay W. Forrester (for Whirlwind, the first real-time computer, and core memory), Alonzo Church, Ken Olsen (minicomputers were a major step from mainframes to personal computers), maybe Max Newman (for Baby). I'm sure a search through lists of Turing Award winners, etc would turn up more. Noel (talk) 15:38, 17 October 2018 (UTC)
What is the logic of the dates/years next to inventors? I'm sorry I'm new to Wikipedia's editing functions (and hence community), so I won't edit anything in the article. But I read the list like the year should correspond to the invention(s). And e.g. Herman Hollerith filed his patent in 1889, whereas in the list the dates 1961, 1969, and 1978 are mentioned. Please help me understand the logic.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Konstantinweiss ( talk • contribs) 14:04, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
In this edit, entries were wrongly grouped, screwing up large numbers of years. Can someone suggest a process to fix? Dicklyon ( talk) 21:03, 21 March 2019 (UTC)
Never mind, I went through and checked them all and fixed two more. The errors were mostly due to the original deletions, not so much the undo that I linked. Dicklyon ( talk) 02:09, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
If someone's good with an editor, please move the blank lines to where they separate entries, so this kind of thing won't get repeated. Dicklyon ( talk) 02:12, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
Why Jonh Postel is not present in this list? -- Rubinetto ( talk) 09:50, 15 March 2020 (UTC)
"Satoshi Nakamoto is the name used by the presumed pseudonymous person or persons who developed bitcoin" ( /info/en/?search=Satoshi_Nakamoto)
The table header is labelled "Person" while this 'Nakamoto' does not uniformly fall under that categorization, being a name possibly representing a group of people. It may be likened to the credit given to the complete works of Shakespeare when said credit has not been proven to be accurate. The suggested edits would not necessarily entail removal of the name altogether, however either re-labeling the table header to something more general such as "Name", or adding a subscript note next to the specific name such as Satoshi Nakamoto[Pseudonym] — Preceding unsigned comment added by AlbertACJefferson ( talk • contribs) 14:35, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
Shouldn't Dan Ingalls be in this list. He was a pioneer of object-oriented programming and invented bitblit, the basis for bitmapped graphics. Bill ( talk) 19:22, 28 June 2020 (UTC) Also should not Dado Banatao be here he designed the first single chip, 16-bit microprocessor-based calculator.[2] In 1981, he developed the first 10-Mbit Ethernet CMOS with silicon coupler data-link control and transceiver chip while working in Seeq Technology. He was also credited for the first system logic chip set for IBM's PC-XT and the PC-AT; the local bus concept and the first Windows Graphics accelerator chip for personal computers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.130.43.171 ( talk) 15:57, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
I just added Bertrand Meyer for [[design by contract]. In my own career this was one of my top ten seminal texts. There's not much new here you won't find in Dijkstra (at least by implication), but Dijkstra's wisdom was often brusque and acerbic, whereas Meyer's modular distillation could be usefully applied by an entire development team the very next day.
Others may differ. Feel free to redact if the consensus is otherwise. My vote is complete in having made this edit in the first place. I will not return to plead this again. — MaxEnt 16:34, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
[Ed: This is actually my continuation from the comment above, but it seemed to need its own heading, so divided out in the same edit.]
As far as Bryan Cantrill goes, whose name I spotted as I scanned the talk page for the general tone of engagement, there is absolutely a category of blue collar pioneers where he properly belongs, along with guys like Walter Bright. The problem with blue collar pioneers is that they are best appreciated from within the trench rather than from above the trench, and you'd never achieve a contained consensus in opening the door to such on a list such as this one. dtrace in my books is pretty close to making the white collar list: it's an entire systems facility for gaining the upper hand on complex concurrent systems, where the dysfunction is embedded in complex interdependencies in the time domain in a way that no other logging facility can usefully twist by the tail.
For a complex, heavily threaded system such as ZFS, even when you have all your guards and interlocks rigorously correct (no mean feat to begin with) they can conspire in unforeseen ways to produce outrageous latency spikes that some reasonable use case simply can't abide.
Lacking a facility as sharp as dtrace, by this point—having merely achieved semantic rigour in data retention—you're dead in the water, short of playing the long game of Whack a Mole, where each effort to eliminate one bizarre latency introduces one or more different bizarre latencies.
So you have a system that's semantically correct, all algorithms and data structures are scale compliant for at least the first six or nine magnitudes, and the code base is thoroughly concurrent over reasonably granular atomic operations. You be done now? No. You still need dtrace to iron out egregious misbehaviour in the latency domain. In my view this is actually a cryptocollar problem. From the nearby access road, it definitely looks like a blue collar problem. Only the further you press into the bush, the whiter it gets.
What to do when everyone else presumes it's a blue problem, but you actually know in your heart of hearts that it's finally a white problem deep when encountered deep in the forest glade? A white paper is not going to cut it with your deluded peers. Far more useful to advance your case is to hand your peers a working proton pack. Make no mistake, dtrace was a magnum opus of the first order in the art form of working proton packs, as you would know if you have ever been close to ground zero to actually notice what it finally buys you. — MaxEnt 16:34, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
I've had difficulty getting Philo T. Farnsworth addition to stick. There's a number of reasons of why he may be ineligible but I believe he belongs on the list, at least as "pioneer of computer displays." In an effort to keep the list more diverse I would accept, and like to also suggest adding Boris Grabovsky and John Logie Baird as "co-pioneers" of the display.
It can for sure be argued that this list is more academic and strictly "computer science" and I would be willing to accept that Farnsworth's contributions are not in that vein. However what drove me to post his addition to the list was the first line of the article:
"This article presents a list of individuals who made transformative breakthroughs in the creation, development and imagining of what computers could do."
Which reminded me of the youtube video of Farnsworth's appearance on 1957 television game show where he talks about about the future of "television" improving the bandwidth and making the display thin like art on a wall with memory and 2k resolution. That video can be found here (this video was my source for my second attempt at adding to list; I thought this was primary and my contribution would stick that time). The first 6 minutes of the video are extremely kitch for 50s TV game show and I think they give Farnsworth lines because I don't believe him when he says he invented TV at 14, so I'm kind of refuting my own source here, but after the contest ends they get more candid about Farnsworth and what he was doing at the time and what he though about the future.
I feel there are perhaps hundreds of other reasons of why Farnsworth would qualify for so many of these "Pioneer's in [technology] lists" and I can imagine the editors of this list may want to keep to strict rules about such things so I put it to you editors, wikipedians: have I shown sufficient evidence for Philo T. Farnsworth inclusion to this list?
StinkPickle4000 ( talk) 06:42, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
We certainly won't find sources calling Farnsworth a computer scientist as his inventions had mostly already shaped the industry before Computer Science was really established. Its the same problem a lot of the historical list members would have. This is why I tend to suggest the broader definition for inclusion to this list that the top of the article provides. StinkPickle4000 ( talk) 21:33, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
It says you can press on some arrows to reorganize the table of pioneers. The function doesn't display on mobile.
Can someone correct that for easier viewing in chronological order? 81.235.37.233 ( talk) 16:33, 13 December 2021 (UTC)
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Much thanks to Dzonatas. This section needed to be broken out from the main Computer Science topic. -- Somewherepurple
I instituted a merge, but I'm not familiar enough with these people: J.C.R. Licklider, Jay Forrester, Norbert Wiener, Vannevar Bush to add them into the table correctly. I hope someone gets to that sometime. Radagast83 05:53, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
http://www.ibiblio.org/pioneers/
Cheers! - Shadowfax0 ( talk) 02:03, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
I think Ivan Sutherland should be added (Known for Sketchpad, considered by many to be the creator of Computer Graphics) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Sutherland —Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.67.87.133 ( talk) 04:02, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
I think an external link to the CHM is germane. It's a non-profit 501(c)(3) org, covering the subject of this Wikipedia article. Board of Trustees looks reputable. Any opinions that say the CHM should not be linked in? -- Iterator12n Talk 22:57, 15 August 2008 (UTC)
What a good system to be able to click on a button to re-order the entries in the table.-- TedColes ( talk) 11:48, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Names I would like to suggest to discuss for inclusion in 'computer pioneers'.
Charles Babbage originated the concept of a digital programmable computer, the analytical engine in 1837.
Ada Lovelace regarded as the first to recognise the full potential of Charles Babbage's analytical engine and the first computer programmer for the work done crating the first program intended to execute on the analytical engine.
Jay W. Forrester coincident-current magnetic core memory, project leader of Whirlwind
Freddie Williams and Tom Kilburn " Williams tube" memory
Dudley Allen Buck inventor of cryotron, content addressable memory, Ferroelectric ram (see my talk page re: my interest in this subject)
Marcian Hoff Intel 4004 Federico Faggin Intel 4004 (leader of intel 4004 project) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.173.127.190 ( talk) 16:14, 18 September 2018 (UTC)
Ken Olsen co-founder Digital Equipment Corp., key person in development of TX-0 computer
James Reid Anderson - co-inventor of the acoustic coupler; founder of Information Terminals, which would be renamed Verbatim disk drive manufacturer;
If anyone knows who to credit for development / perfection of magnetic-drum memory and/or magnetic tape memory, that name might be appropriate for inclusion on this page.
Eccles and Jordan for the Eccles-Jordan flip-flop.
Harry Huskey Standards Western Automatic Computer
Tony Li and Yakov Rekhte, who developed the spec for Border Gateway Protocol, which allows carriers to exchange routes inside their networks and with each-other, allowing the internet to scale infinitely. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mefirefoxes ( talk • contribs) 03:47, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
AlanDewey ( talk) 16:20, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
What about Edward Feigenbaum ?! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 3omarz ( talk • contribs) 17:50, 8 December 2011 (UTC)
This article is biased towards mathematics, algorithms applied in software and the computing machines that run them. But core hardware component inventions and advancements are arguably as necessary to advancements in computer science. Please consider contributors such as William Shockley (Semiconductors), Robert Noyce (et al Phd's) @ Fairchild (IC) & with Ted Hoff (Microprocessor), & with Gordon Moore (Memory), and whomever is responsible for flash memory. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.198.107.11 ( talk) 17:11, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
Does Charles Moore (inventor of FORTH) qualify as a pioneer? Handyandy802 ( talk) 13:41, 14 July 2019 (UTC)
Philo Farnsworth and/or his Russian and/or Scottish competitor? Farnsworth himself advanced technology that was called "TV" for a while and predicted HD resolutions as high as "2000 lines" in 1954 — Preceding unsigned comment added by StinkPickle4000 ( talk • contribs) 02:48, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
John Carmack for innovations in 3-D computer graphics and novel algorithm application in video game design.
John Boyer for advancements in accessibility — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.48.240.237 ( talk) 04:57, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
Marvin Minski was born in 1927, not much of an achievement. I changed Minski's date to the founding of the AI Lab/Project MAC, which is what the table mentions. Likewise, George Boole was fifteen years old in 1830. I changed the date to the publication dates of his works on logic. 75.15.115.245 ( talk) 17:33, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
Shouldn't Bill Gates be on this list? 74.178.186.35 ( talk) 02:08, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
I'm not sure that Bryan Cantrill should be on this list; I don't believe that DTrace is as notable/important to computer science as the rest of the achievements listed. I'm removing him from the list. Blelbach ( talk) 05:06, 15 December 2012 (UTC)
I don't think that al-Khwārizmī qualifies as a pioneer in computer science. Computer science relies on a number of earlier developments and isn't alone in using algorithms. -- TedColes ( talk) 10:49, 27 February 2014 (UTC)
I suggest adding the following people to the list:
Gordon E. Moore developed Moore's Law which empirically showed the increasing speed of computation technology (1965)
Rolf Landauer derived Landauer's principle, giving the thermodynamic limitations of computing systems (1961)
Gene Amdahl developed parallel scaling and Amdahl's law which shows the practical limits of parallelizing a given problem (1967)
John L. Gustafson developed weak scaling and Gustafson's law which helped to precipitate the parallel supercomputing revolution (1988)
— Rememberlands ( talk) 18:18, 11 February 2015 (UTC)
Isn't is a pity that the inventor of the first working general programmable computer ( Konrad Zuse) is last in the table?
I would like to see the table by default sorted in timeline order. Schily ( talk) 12:44, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
It currently reads
The term "algorithm" is derived from the algorism, the technique of performing arithmetic with Hindu-Arabic numerals developed by al-Khwarizmi. Both "algorithm" and "algorism" are derived from the Latinized forms of al-Khwarizmi's name, Algoritmi and Algorismi, respectively. His Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing (Arabic: الكتاب المختصر في حساب الجبر والمقابلة al-Kitāb al-mukhtaṣar fī ḥisāb al-jabr wal-muqābala) is a mathematical book written approximately 830 CE. The word Algebra is also derived from the title of his book and it is believed to be the first book on the subject. The notion of zero is found for the first time in this book. However, it is believed he had learned the notion of zero from Indians through his travels to India. With zero, he was able to invent the systematic Indo-Arabic number (decimal) system. The word algorithm was given in Europe to a method he called "Attarigolkharazmi" (Akharazmi's Method) for taking square root of whole numbers in decimal system. The method is based on first identity ((a+b)^2 = a^2 + b^2, where a= 10^n, n>1). The word "method" was dropped in time and the word algorithm referred to this method of taking square root. As more elaborate ways of doing complex things, in a mechanized way, through mathematical reasoning were discovered/invented, they were all called algorithms. Certain algorithms, such as deriving the greatest common divisor existed way before Alkharazmi (Greek time). However, Europeans were so impressed by Kharazmi's method that his name replaced the world "method".
I addition to being inordinately long, I think it has some errors. That "identity" is false, as a=100, b=2 gives (100+2)^2 = (102)^2 = 1040 while 100^2 + 2^2 = 1004. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.236.221.138 ( talk) 14:55, 12 October 2016 (UTC)
Sure she is accomplished but she is NOT a pioneer in computer science. 152.131.14.9 ( talk) 14:56, 5 April 2017 (UTC)
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I've noticed that one user has added significant changes ( https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=List_of_pioneers_in_computer_science&type=revision&diff=803332873&oldid=799334223) for a lot of achievements that aren't noteworthy in my opinion. Most of them read in the form, the "The first X to do Y", where Y is something that a lot of people have achieved before. A common example is "The first female engineer to do ...". While those achievements are important in their own right, I don't think that makes them pioneers in computer science in general, although some of those in that list might be.
An example of an entry which I think shouldn't be here: "Named third (and first female) Chief Technology Officer of the United States of America (USCTO), succeeding Todd Park."
Just to be clear, I have nothing against entries with women such as Ada Lovelace, as most people that have studied computer science are likely to have heard about.
TLDR: Undo those changes? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gajop ( talk • contribs) 05:38, 13 October 2017 (UTC)
I'm not sure if several recent additions meet the criterium at the top of the article. "This article presents a list of individuals who helped in the creation, development and imagining of what computers and electronics could do." For instance, does this apply to all six original programmers of the ENIAC? For instance, none of them have an entry in Milestones in Computer Science and Information Technology by Edward Reilly. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 18:02, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
Exciting inventions, innovative technology, human interaction, and intriguing politics fill computing history. However, the recorded history is mainly composed of male achievements and involvements, even though women have played substantial roles. This situation is not unusual. Most science fields are notorious for excluding, undervaluing, or overlooking the accomplishments of their female scientists [1, 16, 17, 22]. As J.A.N. Lee points out, it is up to the historians and others to remedy this imbalance...
— Denise Gürer [1]
References
I am under the impression that in the last few years somebody added a long string of names, largely irrelevant to computer science, which hold the sole distinction of being female: https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=List_of_pioneers_in_computer_science&type=revision&diff=805664510&oldid=390493835
Consider for example Marissa Mayer, who "was the first female engineer hired at Google", or Maria Klawe who "was the first woman to become President of the Harvey Mudd College since its founding in 1955", or Megan Smith, "named third USCTO [...] succeeding Todd Park".
They might be scientists, I have my doubts they are distinguished scientists and I am fairly certain they are not pioneers of computer science.
I recommend reverting these changes, as they can only damage the credibility of women in science.
Start, instead, with real pioneers in computer science, like /info/en/?search=Radhia_Cousot, who single-handedly invented abstract interpretation together with Patrick Cousot (over 6000 citations for https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=512973), or Hanne Riis Nielson ( https://scholar.google.it/citations?user=5U0XVHUAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao), or Mariangiola Dezani-Ciancaglini (a student of Corrado Bohem), or ...
Thanks MrFlowerpot ( talk) 21:04, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
The consensus is no in response to the question
does achievement in the field that is notable partly or primarily due to the overcoming of social barriers present within the field, constitute grounds for inclusion in the list?. The consensus is an individual should be included on the list only based on pioneering technical work in the field of computer science.Some editors suggested creating a List of social pioneers in science and technology or <demographic> pioneers in computer science for people who overcame social barriers in the field.
The editors of this page are not entirely in agreement about which people are eligible for inclusion in the list, and request community input. In particular, does achievement in the field that is notable partly or primarily due to the overcoming of social barriers present within the field, constitute grounds for inclusion in the list? Zazpot ( talk) 13:21, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
User Zazpot has undone my removal of Evelyn Boyd Granville and promised references: https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=List_of_pioneers_in_computer_science&oldid=807012207
Copious references for the table entry did come in a timely fashion, but the problem is with the copy itself, not with the lack of references:
"Was the second African-American woman in the U.S. to receive a PhD in mathematics.[4][5][6][7] From 1956 to 1960, she worked for IBM on the Project Vanguard and Project Mercury space programs, developing computer software for analyzing orbits, and continued to work in computer programming, applied mathematics, and mathematical education throughout her career."
This reads as "Granville was an applied mathematician/physicist", not a computer scientist.
"We had a computer in our lab so I was among its 30 users" does not constitute engaging in computer science.
Frankly, this is getting really crazy and I'm doubting of either the sanity of who is contributing to this page or their background in computer science.
As a side note, I believe insistence on an obscure person of African heritage shows a distinctly American-centric view, which seems rather un-NPOV to me (the ongoing oppression of black people in America is a purely American concern).
In fact, if we wanted to really include all possible instantiations of "the first X who did Y", at the very least we would need to add all the Soviet mathematicians and engineers of the era, then, and the Chinese scientists who designed their own computers in the 1960s and 1970s (plenty of interesting folklore: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/1658660/), and so on, possibly down to the first telegraph operator in Mozambique.
MrFlowerpot ( talk) 21:03, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
References
@ Zazpot: - I'd love to hear your explanation for the relevant of Janese Swanson, Carla Meninsky, and Roberta Williams to this list. While generating computer game content with a LFSR is a nice trick, use of such generation techniques is not groundbreaking (e.g. the predating Rogue (video game)) - and is definitely not pioneering in computer science. Being a professional in computing tagged a pioneer by someone does not a pioneer in computer science make. Icewhiz ( talk) 15:30, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
I think this article should include people who have made significant pioneering contributions to computer science, by the judgement of their peers. That would include recipients of:
and maybe others, although the Hopper award is a little limited because it considers the age of the person. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 05:02, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
I removed several individuals with little claim for pioneering in CS from the list. I also tagged Karen Spärck Jones, Barbara J. Grosz, Betty Holberton, Jean E. Sammet, and Rosalind Picard as WP:UNDUE. All are notable professionals and academics with some significant contributions and 2nd/3rd tier awards, however it is unclear to me that they meet a pioneering in CS threshold for inclusion here and I would appreciate additional input. Icewhiz ( talk) 09:01, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
Under See Also, I added a link to the relevant IEEE Computer Pioneer Award. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 19:13, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
So, if I understand correctly, user Zazpot's 10 day long tantrum is culminating with the claim that there is a male/western "systemic bias" ( https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=List_of_pioneers_in_computer_science&oldid=808087384), which if I understand correctly is something "created by the shared social and cultural characteristics of most editors" ( /info/en/?search=Wikipedia:Systemic_bias).
This comes after two or three pages of discussion have been spent in which more or less everybody has kept suggesting that individuals of female gender with no achievement whatsoever on the list (e.g. graphic designers, cabinet ministers...) be replaced with Turing prize and EATCS Award winners of compatible gender. It is also my impression that the user in question has kept a steadfast opposition with increasingly byzantine reasoning.
In case the reader's wits are particularly slow, I'll sum it up as follows: everyone but Zazpot wants to improve representation of women as well as non-American scientists on this list in terms of both quality and quantity.
If I am to loosely translate a saying from my native land, I'd say this amounts to "pissing on the roses and blaming the wolf for it".
I suppose the call for deletion also show's the user's willingness to "cut the baby in half" (as in /info/en/?search=Judgment_of_Solomon) when faced with the impossibility of controlling the page's content.
I see the following possible explanations for this:
As I've stated otherwise, in a strictly game-theoretic sense, as a white male computer scientist ("aaargh, cis scum!") I benefit from this user's efforts in lowering the quality of Wikipedia as a whole and in misrepresenting both computer science and women's contributions to it, as this both appreciates my degree, my accumulated knowledge and my Y chromosome.
Everybody, have fun with this, life is frankly too short for spending days in working against those who are unwittingly trying to maximize your utility. Sir or Madam, please continue working for my benefit.
This will be my last post at least until sanity is re-established (last but not least because I'm likely going to get banned - pity, I registered because I was trying to do a public service, but I see bullies are privileged around here). — Preceding unsigned comment added by MrFlowerpot ( talk • contribs) 21:50, 31 October 2017 (UTC) — MrFlowerpot ( talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
yes, many of these comments reek of systemic white male bias.Many of you should be ashamed of yourselves. User:Zazpot, I thank you for your efforts in this matter. Deletion and general lack of representation of women (and non-white, and non-western people) is a serious problem on WP, The Guardian even has a whole article on it, not that the people who need to read it will :-/ See also Women_in_science#Social.2C_historical_and_critical_studies. SemanticMantis ( talk) 16:29, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
Deletion is not the answer; let's work out some criteria. It seems to me that sensible criteria would remove some of the males, and perhaps help us be more fair to the females and others. Like why are Shima and Tukey here? Chip layout and FFT are not computer science, imho. But if the criterion includes Fellows of the Computer History Museum, then Shima is in. Tukey, still not, even though he was a great pioneer in statistics and such (OK, maybe I'm wrong about him; his article says he came up with the term "bit"; but not for FFT). Dicklyon ( talk) 16:32, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
what do we mean by "pioneers"?Meters ( talk) 04:55, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
Wikipedia does not publish original research. Its content is determined by previously published information rather than the beliefs or experiences of its editors.
"We should formulate" what "we mean by pioneers" is WP:NOR.") - is NOT WP:OR. To the contrary, it is accepted practice in Wikipedia to set inclusion criteria. See WP:LISTV#INC and WP:LEADFORALIST. Setting criteria is exactly what editors do. Note that Wikipedia:Lists in Wikipedia#Lists should generally only represent consensus opinion runs contrary to some of your edits (which were based on a single (or few) source(s) (sometimes RS, sometimes iffy) saying X was a pioneer (of computing? Of first X of type Y to do Z in computing? Both flew)). Icewhiz ( talk) 14:31, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
[Be] aware of original research when selecting the criteria for inclusion: use a criterion that is widely agreed upon rather than inventing new criteria that cannot be verified as notable or that is not widely accepted.
It should not be asserted that the most popular view or some sort of intermediate view among the different views is the correct one.
"unambiguous, objective, and supported by reliable sources.") is an editorial decision. Icewhiz ( talk) 15:44, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
I've ordered the book The Computer Pioneers: The Making of the Modern Computer. It was published in 1986, but it should be a good reference for pioneers. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 17:25, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
Page 206 of the book lists these people as the main ones to get computing into the electronic era: JP Eckert, W Eckert, J Mauchly, J Brainerd, J Atanasoff, C Berry, K Zuse, G Stibitz, J von Neumann, T Flowers, A Coombs, IJ Good, A Turing, H Aiken, V Bush, G Hopper, N Wiener, O Velben, and DH Lehmer. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 01:10, 10 November 2017 (UTC)
I have nominated this page for deletion on the basis that a list of this type is inherently WP:OR. The fact that a debate is going on here about the merit of various computer scientists is, in my mind, a great reason for the existence of the WP:OR policy. CapitalSasha ~ talk 06:30, 9 November 2017 (UTC)
Would this list be more informative if items were listed chronologically? One point in favor of it is that readers would then be able to trace the history of the innovations while at the same time familiarizing themselves with the individuals. Or maybe a separate alphabetical list of names-only after the chart. Randy Kryn ( talk) 06:13, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
I cannot take the page seriously when it starts jumping from year 830 directly to 1944. Bohan ( talk) 16:38, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
I removed this section from the table (more correctly, commented it out):
|- | 2007 | [[Nick McKeown]], Scott Shenkar, Martin Casado | Created [[Software Defined Networking]]
I'm not sure if it was inadvertently added or added as a joke. If it was genuinely added then I think it should be discussed first since there does not appear to be anything pioneering "XXX as a service", with XXX=Networking. I also fear it will lead to additional taint, like including Software Defined Radios or Cloud Computing as pioneering milestones. Jeffrey Walton ( talk) 14:10, 3 October 2018 (UTC)
This list still has problems; it's too long, and includes too many people who did not have a significant impact.
First, the title of the list ('pioneers in computer science') would to my mind mostly rule out anyone before the 1930s (modulo Babbage, Lovelace and a few others) since none of them really had a significant CS impact.
Another big one is a seeming attempt to add more women just to... have more women in the list. This has produced such absurdities as listing Elizabeth Feinler and not Jon Postel (Jake is a wonderful person, but her accomplishments don't, I think, merit inclusion on this list, whereas Jon's might); listing Sally Floyd, but not Van Jacobson (although Van did important stuff, but not to the point of being worthy of being in this list), etc. (If you don't understand why I have paired them, you need to study them, and what they worked on, a bit more.) There are women who absolutely belong (starting with Grace Hopper and Lynn Conway, although it's not clear which class to credit the latter to), but trying to add women just to have more females is just as pernicious as adding (or removing) people because of their skin colour. Historical/etc circumstances have left an un-balanced list, but... it is what it is. What's next, adding more female musicians to a list of jazz greats to make it more balanced? (To show just how pernicious balancing can be, how about adding more white musicians? Nonsense, of course.)
And several notable names that IMO are missing: Christopher Strachey, Jay W. Forrester (for Whirlwind, the first real-time computer, and core memory), Alonzo Church, Ken Olsen (minicomputers were a major step from mainframes to personal computers), maybe Max Newman (for Baby). I'm sure a search through lists of Turing Award winners, etc would turn up more. Noel (talk) 15:38, 17 October 2018 (UTC)
What is the logic of the dates/years next to inventors? I'm sorry I'm new to Wikipedia's editing functions (and hence community), so I won't edit anything in the article. But I read the list like the year should correspond to the invention(s). And e.g. Herman Hollerith filed his patent in 1889, whereas in the list the dates 1961, 1969, and 1978 are mentioned. Please help me understand the logic.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Konstantinweiss ( talk • contribs) 14:04, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
In this edit, entries were wrongly grouped, screwing up large numbers of years. Can someone suggest a process to fix? Dicklyon ( talk) 21:03, 21 March 2019 (UTC)
Never mind, I went through and checked them all and fixed two more. The errors were mostly due to the original deletions, not so much the undo that I linked. Dicklyon ( talk) 02:09, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
If someone's good with an editor, please move the blank lines to where they separate entries, so this kind of thing won't get repeated. Dicklyon ( talk) 02:12, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
Why Jonh Postel is not present in this list? -- Rubinetto ( talk) 09:50, 15 March 2020 (UTC)
"Satoshi Nakamoto is the name used by the presumed pseudonymous person or persons who developed bitcoin" ( /info/en/?search=Satoshi_Nakamoto)
The table header is labelled "Person" while this 'Nakamoto' does not uniformly fall under that categorization, being a name possibly representing a group of people. It may be likened to the credit given to the complete works of Shakespeare when said credit has not been proven to be accurate. The suggested edits would not necessarily entail removal of the name altogether, however either re-labeling the table header to something more general such as "Name", or adding a subscript note next to the specific name such as Satoshi Nakamoto[Pseudonym] — Preceding unsigned comment added by AlbertACJefferson ( talk • contribs) 14:35, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
Shouldn't Dan Ingalls be in this list. He was a pioneer of object-oriented programming and invented bitblit, the basis for bitmapped graphics. Bill ( talk) 19:22, 28 June 2020 (UTC) Also should not Dado Banatao be here he designed the first single chip, 16-bit microprocessor-based calculator.[2] In 1981, he developed the first 10-Mbit Ethernet CMOS with silicon coupler data-link control and transceiver chip while working in Seeq Technology. He was also credited for the first system logic chip set for IBM's PC-XT and the PC-AT; the local bus concept and the first Windows Graphics accelerator chip for personal computers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.130.43.171 ( talk) 15:57, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
I just added Bertrand Meyer for [[design by contract]. In my own career this was one of my top ten seminal texts. There's not much new here you won't find in Dijkstra (at least by implication), but Dijkstra's wisdom was often brusque and acerbic, whereas Meyer's modular distillation could be usefully applied by an entire development team the very next day.
Others may differ. Feel free to redact if the consensus is otherwise. My vote is complete in having made this edit in the first place. I will not return to plead this again. — MaxEnt 16:34, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
[Ed: This is actually my continuation from the comment above, but it seemed to need its own heading, so divided out in the same edit.]
As far as Bryan Cantrill goes, whose name I spotted as I scanned the talk page for the general tone of engagement, there is absolutely a category of blue collar pioneers where he properly belongs, along with guys like Walter Bright. The problem with blue collar pioneers is that they are best appreciated from within the trench rather than from above the trench, and you'd never achieve a contained consensus in opening the door to such on a list such as this one. dtrace in my books is pretty close to making the white collar list: it's an entire systems facility for gaining the upper hand on complex concurrent systems, where the dysfunction is embedded in complex interdependencies in the time domain in a way that no other logging facility can usefully twist by the tail.
For a complex, heavily threaded system such as ZFS, even when you have all your guards and interlocks rigorously correct (no mean feat to begin with) they can conspire in unforeseen ways to produce outrageous latency spikes that some reasonable use case simply can't abide.
Lacking a facility as sharp as dtrace, by this point—having merely achieved semantic rigour in data retention—you're dead in the water, short of playing the long game of Whack a Mole, where each effort to eliminate one bizarre latency introduces one or more different bizarre latencies.
So you have a system that's semantically correct, all algorithms and data structures are scale compliant for at least the first six or nine magnitudes, and the code base is thoroughly concurrent over reasonably granular atomic operations. You be done now? No. You still need dtrace to iron out egregious misbehaviour in the latency domain. In my view this is actually a cryptocollar problem. From the nearby access road, it definitely looks like a blue collar problem. Only the further you press into the bush, the whiter it gets.
What to do when everyone else presumes it's a blue problem, but you actually know in your heart of hearts that it's finally a white problem deep when encountered deep in the forest glade? A white paper is not going to cut it with your deluded peers. Far more useful to advance your case is to hand your peers a working proton pack. Make no mistake, dtrace was a magnum opus of the first order in the art form of working proton packs, as you would know if you have ever been close to ground zero to actually notice what it finally buys you. — MaxEnt 16:34, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
I've had difficulty getting Philo T. Farnsworth addition to stick. There's a number of reasons of why he may be ineligible but I believe he belongs on the list, at least as "pioneer of computer displays." In an effort to keep the list more diverse I would accept, and like to also suggest adding Boris Grabovsky and John Logie Baird as "co-pioneers" of the display.
It can for sure be argued that this list is more academic and strictly "computer science" and I would be willing to accept that Farnsworth's contributions are not in that vein. However what drove me to post his addition to the list was the first line of the article:
"This article presents a list of individuals who made transformative breakthroughs in the creation, development and imagining of what computers could do."
Which reminded me of the youtube video of Farnsworth's appearance on 1957 television game show where he talks about about the future of "television" improving the bandwidth and making the display thin like art on a wall with memory and 2k resolution. That video can be found here (this video was my source for my second attempt at adding to list; I thought this was primary and my contribution would stick that time). The first 6 minutes of the video are extremely kitch for 50s TV game show and I think they give Farnsworth lines because I don't believe him when he says he invented TV at 14, so I'm kind of refuting my own source here, but after the contest ends they get more candid about Farnsworth and what he was doing at the time and what he though about the future.
I feel there are perhaps hundreds of other reasons of why Farnsworth would qualify for so many of these "Pioneer's in [technology] lists" and I can imagine the editors of this list may want to keep to strict rules about such things so I put it to you editors, wikipedians: have I shown sufficient evidence for Philo T. Farnsworth inclusion to this list?
StinkPickle4000 ( talk) 06:42, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
We certainly won't find sources calling Farnsworth a computer scientist as his inventions had mostly already shaped the industry before Computer Science was really established. Its the same problem a lot of the historical list members would have. This is why I tend to suggest the broader definition for inclusion to this list that the top of the article provides. StinkPickle4000 ( talk) 21:33, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
It says you can press on some arrows to reorganize the table of pioneers. The function doesn't display on mobile.
Can someone correct that for easier viewing in chronological order? 81.235.37.233 ( talk) 16:33, 13 December 2021 (UTC)