Person

Donald Knuth

b. 1938

American computer scientist and mathematician (born 1938)

Born
10 Jan 1938 · Milwaukee

Life timeline

Their life from birth to death. On the timeline, world events of the time are shown faintly.

Showing 101 years
  1. 10 Jan 1938BornBorn in Milwaukee
  2. 1971AwardGrace Murray Hopper Award
  3. 1972AwardGuggenheim Fellowship
  4. 1974AwardTuring Award
  5. 1975AwardPaul R. Halmos - Lester R. Ford Awards
  6. 1978AwardJosiah Willard Gibbs Lectureship
  7. 1979AwardNational Medal of Science
  8. 1980AwardFellow of the British Computer Society
  9. 1980AwardW. Wallace McDowell Award
  10. 1986AwardACM Software System Award
  11. 1986AwardHonorary doctorate from University of Paris-XI
  12. 1986AwardLeroy P. Steele Prize
  13. 1988AwardFranklin Medal

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Meanwhile in the world

Major world events during their lifetime (1938 – today).

  1. 19381938 FIFA World Cup
  2. 1938Munich Agreement
  3. 1939 – 1940Winter War
  4. 1939 – 1945World War II
  5. 1940 – 1945Auschwitz concentration camp
  6. 1941Attack on Pearl Harbor
  7. 1941 – 1945Eastern Front
  8. 1941Operation Barbarossa
  9. 1942 – 1943Battle of Stalingrad
  10. 1945Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
  11. 1945 – 1946Nuremberg trials
  12. 19501950 FIFA World Cup
  13. 1950 – 1953Korean War
  14. 1953 – 1959Cuban Revolution
  15. 19541954 FIFA World Cup
  16. 1955 – 1975Vietnam War
  17. 1956Hungarian Revolution of 1956
  18. 1956Suez Crisis
  19. 19581958 FIFA World Cup
  20. 1959Antarctic Treaty System
  21. 19621962 FIFA World Cup
  22. 1962Cuban Missile Crisis
  23. 19661966 FIFA World Cup
  24. 1966 – 1976Cultural Revolution
  25. 1968Prague Spring
  26. 1969Apollo 11 Moon landing
  27. 19721972 Summer Olympics
  28. 19741974 FIFA World Cup
  29. 19781978 FIFA World Cup
  30. 1978 – 1979Iranian Revolution
  31. 1979 – 1989Soviet–Afghan War
  32. 1980 – 1988Iran–Iraq War
  33. 19841984 Summer Olympics
  34. 1985Schengen Agreement
  35. 19891989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre
  36. 1989Fall of the Berlin Wall
  37. 19901990 FIFA World Cup
  38. 1991Dissolution of the Soviet Union
  39. 19941994 FIFA World Cup
  40. 1994 – 1996First Chechen War

Biography

Donald Ervin Knuth ( kə-NOOTH; born January 10, 1938) is an American computer scientist and mathematician. He is a professor emeritus at Stanford University. He is the 1974 recipient of the ACM Turing Award, informally considered the Nobel Prize of computer science. Knuth has been called the "father of the analysis of algorithms".

Knuth is the author of the multi-volume work The Art of Computer Programming. He contributed to the development of the rigorous analysis of the computational complexity of algorithms and systematized formal mathematical techniques for it. In the process, he also popularized the asymptotic notation. In addition to fundamental contributions in several branches of theoretical computer science, Knuth is the creator of the TeX computer typesetting system, the related METAFONT font definition language and rendering system, and the Computer Modern family of typefaces.

As a writer and scholar, Knuth created the WEB and CWEB computer programming systems designed to encourage and facilitate literate programming, and designed the MIX/MMIX instruction set architectures. He strongly opposes the granting of software patents, and has expressed his opinion to the United States Patent and Trademark Office and European Patent Organisation.

Text from the Wikipedia article Donald Knuth, CC BY-SA 4.0

About this information

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