Today in #ComputingHistory in 1956, IBM released the first FORTRAN (FORmula TRANslation) manual, six months before the compiler was even ready. Developed under John Backus, FORTRAN introduced the idea that computers could be programmed in a high-level, human-readable language. The manual’s early release let scientists and engineers begin learning and preparing programs before they could actually run them, setting the stage for the 1957 debut of the revolutionary FORTRAN compiler, which transform

Happy Birthday, Silvio Micali! Micali received the #ACMTuringAward in 2012 along with Shafi Goldwasser, for transformative work that laid the complexity-theoretic foundations for the science of cryptography, and in the process pioneered new methods for efficient verification of mathematical proofs in complexity theory. In this video, Micali describes the familial roots of his interest in interactive proofs and introduces his work on zero knowledge proofs: https://youtu.be/LXF882rEIj8 | ACM - Ass

Happy Birthday, Judea Pearl! Pearl received the 2011 #ACMTuringAward for fundamental contributions to artificial intelligence through the development of a calculus for probabilistic and causal reasoning. In this video, Pearl reflects on how his early education in Tel Aviv sparked his love of science and discovery. Many of his teachers, some as early as grade school, were Jewish professors who had been forced out of German universities in the 1930s under Nazi antisemitic laws, years before the Ho

From September 15 to October 15, ACM celebrated Hispanic Heritage Month (Iberoamerican Heritage Month) by honoring Latin and Hispanic individuals who have made considerable contributions to the ACM community. We are proud to be highlighting several prominent Latin and Hispanic computing professionals for their accomplishments that have left a tremendous impact on the computing field. Follow ACM social media and #HispanicHeritageMonth to revisit our posts related to this campaign. | ACM - Associa

Happy Birthday, John E. Hopcroft! Hopcroft received the #ACMTuringAward with Robert E. Tarjan in 1986 for fundamental achievements in the design and analysis of algorithms and data structures. Hopcroft’s work on graph algorithms was not just theoretical analysis, it also included synthesis. He explored efficient structures for storing data in a computer, and created efficient algorithms for solving the problems they could represent. This work, new and exciting at the time, is now part of the sta

Watch 2019 Turing Award Recipient Ed Catmull discuss LucasFilm. Full lecture here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdPXBnJWai8 | ACM - Association for Computing Machinery