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Heinz Zemanek Passes At 94
Knuckles writes Austrian computer pioneer Heinz Zemanek, the first person to build a fully transistorized computer on the European mainland, died in Vienna, aged 94 (link in German). Officially named Binär dezimaler Volltransistor-Rechenautomat (binary-decimal fully transistorized computing automaton), but known as "Mailüfterl", the computer was built in 1955 and in 1958 calculated 5073548261 to be a prime number in 66 minutes. Its power was comparable to a small tube computer of the time, and it measured 4 by 2.5 by 0.5 meters. "Mailüfterl" means "may breeze" in Viennese German and was a play on US computers of the time, like MIT's Whirlwind. 'Even if it cannot match the rapid calculation speed of American models called "Whirlwind" or "Typhoon", it will be enough for a "Wiener Mailüfterl"' (Viennese may breeze), said Zemanek. Mailüfterl contained 3,000 transistors, 5,000 diodes, 1,000 assembly platelets, 100,000 solder joints, 15,000 resistors, 5,000 capacitors and 20,000 meters switching wire. It was built as an underground project at and without financial support from the technical university of Vienna, were Zemanek was an assistant professor at the time. In 1961, Zemanek and his team moved to IBM, who built them their own lab in Vienna. In 1976, Zemanek became an IBM Fellow and stayed at IBM until his retirement in 1985. He was crucial in the creation of the formal definition of the programming language PL/I. The definition language used was VDL (Vienna Definition Language), a direct predecessor of VDM Specification Language (VDM-SL). He remained a professor in Vienna and held regular lectures until 2006.
He be der man if ever der was ders man he was das.
"Mailüfterl" means "may breeze"
No it doesn't - it means "May breeze," as in the month, not as in the possibility.
Viennese may breeze
Are people from Vienna particular aloof?
A German wouldn't have made this mistake!
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Depends on how you define computer!
Just look up Charles Babbage or Konrad Zuse.
Passed what? A kidney stone? Another car?
Oh, you mean "died". I get it now.
I for one welcome our new feline overlords from the Jovian moon of Europa.
Requiescat in pace.
+1 for Konrad Zuse and his work on a high-level programming language and the design ability to read instructions from used perforated 35 mm film.
Konrad Zuse http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K...
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
I've never heard of this guy, but calling your Computer "Mailüfterl" in contrast to other ones named "Wirlwind" definitely gives him instant credit with me. Must have been a fun guy to be lectured by. ... Seriously, this may actually be the very first non-gigantomaniac humourous computer name in history.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Maybe that's his greatest contribution. Possibly he's what inspired the Unix name to be a play on Multics, C to be a play on BPL, and the literally uncountable other successor puns (in the *nix-verse alone!)?
Heinz Zemanek Passes At 94
Do they Autobahns in Austria, then? Cos over here that kind of thing will get you a ticket.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
The important takeaway from this article is that, as long as you keep on working and are passionate, age means little. There's a bunch of computer guys that code til' they drop.
Like the Model-View-Controller inventor who at 84 is hacking away every day at his new projects: http://heim.ifi.uio.no/~trygver/
And the funny thing is, he's doing his best work ever.
Your condiments will be missed.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
So nothing to do with Heinz beans?
I don't know why people keep pretending that we had computers back then when clearly we only have computers because of space.
I mean steam engines were the result of human ingenuity and tinkering. So were internal combustion engines. And the vacuum tube. And the transistor.
But computers? Those needed space.
This headline confused me, because I'd read elsewhere that he died.
So was he [sur] passed before or after he died?
Why use three syllables when 35 will do.
I bet when he was working on his computer he wondered if the world would ever ketchup.
He was a great man and a good researcher. Had the pleasure to attend some of his courses. He also wrote a good book about calendar sciences.