time. Robert Sedgewick Dec. 20th Born: Dec. 20, 1946; USA ALGOL 68 Adopted Boris Sedgewick's research interests Dec. 20, 1968 relate to the analysis of Artashesovich algorithms, and his textbook on ALGOL 68 (short for the subject is a standard in the ALGOrithmic Language 1968) Babayan field. He also teaches the subject was conceived as a successor to on Coursera [April 18]. ALGOL 60 [Jan 11] by IFIP Born: Dec. 20, 1933; Working Group 2.1. It had many Baku, Soviet Union Sedgewick and Leo J. Guibas more features (e.g. user- invented the red–black tree, a declared types, reference In the 1970's, Babayan type of self-balancing binary parameters, strings, matrix developed the first Soviet search tree. A balanced tree is slicing, and concurrency) and a superscalar computers, the desirable since it makes more rigorously defined syntax Elbrus-1 and Elbrus-2, at the searching for and changing and semantics, based on a two- Lebedev Institute of Precision elements faster. The tree's two level grammar formalism Mechanics and Computer colors (actually one bit of extra invented by Adriaan van Engineering (IPMCE ) in data) help to keep the tree Wijngaarden [Nov 2]. Moscow. This was followed by balanced during element the Elbrus 16-bit supercomputer insertions and deletions. The language was criticized for series (starting with the Elbrus 3 abandoning the elegant in 1986). These computers were In 1999 he was asked to list the simplicity of ALGOL 60, even by used in the Soviet space top-ten books every developer some of its own design program and for nuclear should read. The only non- committee members, including weapons research. programming text he mentioned Tony Hoare [Jan 11] and Edsger was “The Visual Display of Dijkstra [May 11]. Quantitative Information” by Edward Tufte [April 20]. As a result, later revisions removed some of the more complicated ideas, such as proceduring and formal bounds. Billion Dollar Brain These changes were also partly due to the experience of Released implementing a compiler for the Dec. 20, 1967 simpler ALGOL 68-R at the UK's Royal Radar Establishment “Billion Dollar Brain” is an (RRE). The implementers, Ian F. espionage film directed by Ken Currie, Susan G. Bond, and John Russell, based on a novel of the D. Morrison, announced their same name by Len Deighton work during the July 1970 IFIP [June 29]. It features Michael meeting to discuss Boris Babayan (2007). Own Caine as secret agent Harry implementing ALGOL 68. The attendees were astonished that work. CC BY-SA 3.0. Palmer. the compiler was ready, since The “brain” of the title is a estimates had been circulating Babayan was one of the first sophisticated computer which of up to 100 man-years to write computer science student in manages a worldwide anti- one. Russia – a field so new it was Soviet spy network, which still called “machine speaks using the actor's Donald Philip Woodward (another RRE mathematics” when he enrolled Sutherland’s voice. Sutherland engineer) and Susan Bond were at the Moscow Institute of also has a small role as a responsible for the first easily Physics and Technology in 1951. computer technician. understandable guide to ALGOL 68. The first print run of 17,000 Babayan began working at The brain’s consoles belong to a copies quickly sold out. IPMCE in 1956, initially on Honeywell 200 [July 14] (H200), Sergey Lebedev’s [Nov 2] BESM- which were filmed on site at a Although European defence 2. Like Lebedev, he enjoyed Honeywell facility in the UK. agencies promoted the use of mountain climbing, and won a Several H200 peripherals ALGOL 68, the American side of silver medal in the 1957 USSR appear in the movie's opening NATO decided to develop Ada National Championships. credits, decorated with the [Dec 10] instead, and made that words “reaction”, “ingenuity”, language obligatory for US Other soviet computing pioneers and “versatility”. The same defense contracts. include Bashir Rameyev [May 1], panels figure on the jacket of and Georgi Lopato [Aug 23]. Deighton’s book, reissued at the 1 walking independently in a Flash Memory human-like fashion (i.e. on two Dec. 20, 1980 legs), even on rough surfaces and stairs, and able to recover Flash memory was invented by from sudden destabilizing Fujio Masuoka while working at external forces. It was 180 cm Toshiba. His team had come up tall and weighed 210 kg. with a new type of EEPROM The P2 had two hands that could (electrically erasable perform tasks such as tightening programmable read-only bolts, using a screwdriver, memory) that employed a single opening and closing doors, and transistor rather than the usual lifting up to 2 kg. two – a small difference that had a huge impact on cost. Erasing There had been a P1, developed his EEPROM also took much less back in 1993, but Honda kept its time. existence a secret until after the P2 was announced. The name “flash” was suggested by Masuoka’s colleague, Shōji Ariizumi, because the memory erasing process reminded him of the flash of a camera. Masuoka, along with Hisakazu Iizuka, filed a patent on Nov 13, 1981, and it was granted on this day. Toshiba recognized his efforts by awarding him a bonus worth a “few hundred dollars”. Not long after, Masuoka left Toshiba to become a professor at Tohoku University, and later sued his former employer demanding fairer compensation for his efforts. The settlement in 2006 was for ¥87m ($758,000). Honda P3. Photo by by machu. CC BY 2.0. Apple to Buy NeXT The P-series continued for a Dec. 20, 1996 while (P3, P4), and then became the ASIMO [Oct 21], with later Apple announced its plan to buy robots becoming smaller, NeXT Software [Oct 12] for an lighter, and more energy estimated $429 million; the deal efficient. was completed on Feb. 4, 1997. For more humanoid robots, see Apple's intention was to utilize [March 16], [Sept 5]. the NeXTSTEP OS as the basis of its future Mac OS X [March 24]. Perhaps more importantly, it also brought Steve Jobs [Feb 24] back into the fold, and by [Sept 16] he had reclaimed the CEO position. Honda P2 Unveiled Dec. 20, 1996 The Honda P2 was the first humanoid robot capable of 2 .