OpenGear Networks
Friday, 14 October 2011
Dennis Ritchie passed away on the 12th of October 2011. With his passing away, an era comes to an end. Dennis' contributions touch practically everything related to computers today, including the iEverythings. It is sad that the world at large is still unaware of who he his and of the immensity of his contributions. There were mentions of his passing, but they sadly fall significantly short of what he very richly deserves. Fortunately there are a few choice write-ups (links below). Wired[9] has opening lines that sum it up very nicely:
The tributes to Dennis Ritchie won’t match the river of praise that spilled out over the web after the death of Steve Jobs. But they should.
And then some.
Anyway, here are a number of tributes, eulogies and obituaries for him. Special mention to [12], Rob Pike's mention of Dennis Ritchie's passing away on Google+, and to [13], which is not an obituary but Ritchie's Lecture on winning the Turing Award from the August 1984 issue of Communications of the ACM (cf [10]).
URL[1]: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/14/technology/dennis-ritchie-programming-trailblazer-dies-at-70.html
URL[2]: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/oct/13/dennis-ritchie
URL[3]: http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2011/10/obituary-0
URL[4]: http://www.economist.com/node/21536536
URL[5]: http://tech.slashdot.org/story/11/10/13/0328230/dennis-ritchie-creator-of-c-programming-language-passed-away
URL[6]: http://www.acm.org/news/featured/ritchie
URL[7]: http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/dennis-ritchie-founder-of-unix-and-c-dies-at-70/2011/10/13/gIQAXsVXiL_story.html
URL[8]: http://www.economist.com/node/2724348
URL[9]: http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2011/10/thedennisritchieeffect/
URL[10]: http://www.acm.org/news/featured/ritchie
URL[11]: http://www.salon.com/2011/10/13/dennis_ritchie_the_geek_prometheus/
URL[12]: https://plus.google.com/u/0/101960720994009339267/posts/ENuEDDYfvKP?hl=en
URL[13]: http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=358207&dl=ACM
Benoît Mandelbrot, father of fractal geometry, died on October 14th, aged 85
The Economist has a very beautiful tribute to Mandelbrot[1] and it makes for very interesting reading (as always, it is after all The Economist!). They pay a small tribute to the man and his art and how it has made immense contributions to a better understanding of many diverse subjects.
Here's a brief extract (see [1] for the full article):
MATHEMATICS is a curious subject. Though often classed as one, it is not really a science. That scientists use it to describe their interpretation of reality is not quite the same thing. Nor, though, is it an art—not, at any rate, in the modern meaning of that word. The aesthetics of the subject, which any mathematician will tell you are the driving force behind his passion, are not obvious to the senses in the way that those of a painting, a symphony or a play are. Yet Benoît Mandelbrot’s celebrity beyond the academy is largely due to art in its modern, sensuous, sense. For the “set” to which he gave his name, when computed, drawn on a complex plane and suitably tinted, appealed greatly to the senses—as a million posters, greetings cards and T-shirts, bought by people who had not the faintest idea what it was, attest.
Oct 21st 2010 - From The Economist print edition
URL[1]: http://www.economist.com/node/17305197/print
Note: See the following for other tributes to Benoit Mandelbrot.
URL: https://www.opengear.net/blog/2010/10/17#BenoitMandelbrot-Obituary-20101017
Sunday, 17 October 2010
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Benoit Mandelbrot passed away today. The Mandelbrot set is one of the most colourful, intriguing and beautiful pictures one will find that is mapped so directly and elegantly to mathematics. Mandelbrot popularised Mathematics a lot by virtue of the beauty of fractals and their very appealing images (all the while also explaining a lot of complex phenomena). The NY Times has an obituary here[1] along with the mandatory image[2]. Slashdot has coverage[3] and so does the BBC[4]. The BBC Magazine also has a brief article on "How Mandelbrot's fractals changed the world" here[5]. I'm sure there'll be more for this worthy mathematician who certainly made mathematics far more beautiful for the lay person. |
URL[1]: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/us/17mandelbrot.html?pagewanted=all
URL[2]: http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2010/10/17/us/MANDLEBROT2-obit.html
URL[3]: http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/10/16/1446231/Benoit-Mandelbrot-Dies-At-85
URL[4]: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/mobile/world-europe-11560101
URL[5]: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-11564766
Yesterday was Debian's 17th Birthday! Slashdot has a post[1] and OSNews also has a brief post [2] both referencing the same original article[3]. There's a really nice tribute [4] page and comments page [5].
Debian was the first distribution to really elegantly solve the dependency
hell problem that plagued the various distributions that
existed back in the day. Now most distributions do the "right thing" in that
they fetch dependencies automagically, so the package manager is no longer the
sole differentiating factor. Debian nevertheless is a really elegant
distribution that still strives for stability (at least for the stable
distribution). Coupled with the very large platform support and the very large
package repository, it is still one of the finest Linux distributions around.
Happy Birthday Debian and here's to looking forward to many many more years of your association.
URL[1]: http://linux.slashdot.org/story/10/08/16/1512223/Happy-17th-Birthday-Debian
URL[2]: http://www.osnews.com/story/23693/Happy_17th_Birthday_Debian
URL[3]: http://digitizor.com/2010/08/16/happy-17th-birthday-debian-and-some-interesting-history/
URL[4]: http://thank.debian.net/thank_debian
URL[5]: http://thank.debian.net/read_thanks