RIP Dennis Ritchie, 1941 - 2011

a1s

So apparently Denis Ritchie, creator of C and co-creator of UNIX, died on Wednesday, and I haven't even found out until today. Chances are, you didn't either, so there: he died. And now that you know, you can get on with your lives, ignoring one of the greats of computer science, because the things he created didn't have nifty graphics and didn't produce helpful Clippits when you shake them. Just, you know, the little things, like the foundation of modern languages those things are written in.

A random JFGI article
Wikipedia page on who that is

WikepediaDennis MacAlistair Ritchie (September 9, 1941 – October 12, 2011), commonly known by his username "dmr", was an American computer scientist who "helped shape the digital era." He created the C programming language and, with long-time colleague, Ken Thompson, the UNIX operating system. Ritchie and Thompson received the Turing Award from the ACM in 1983, the Hamming Medal from the IEEE in 1990 and the National Medal of Technology from President Clinton in 1999. Ritchie was the head of Lucent Technologies System Software Research Department when he retired in 2007.

Dragonmaster Lou

Mentioned it in the celebrity deaths thread... but yeah... truly very unfortunate.

Luke Burrage

He did the best of his work decades ago. Nobody is saying he didn't do anything of note, but there are people who die all the time who did things of note twenty, thirty, or forty years ago.

The reason why Steve Jobs dying is a big deal is that he was doing work of note this year. He was instrumental in revolutionizing many industries, computers, consumer electronics and mobile technology in particular. The day the iPhone went on the website, it had a million pre-orders. A million pre-orders in the same week as the creative force behind the product died. And it only had as few as a million pre-orders because anyone else who wanted one probably already has the iPhone 4 or is happy with their 3Gs or iPod Touch.

How many more industries, or the personal lives of average people, would Denis Ritchie impact if he had lived another 10 years? He retired in 2007, so I'm guessing not many. How many more industries and people would Steve Jobs have impacted if he'd lived another 10 years? That is anyone's guess. The man was genius who got shit done.

a1s

Seriously? How would you feel if people didn't care about your juggling (that's what you do, right? It would be embarrassing if you're actually some sort of Nobel laureate, who I only know for his side activities...), just because you avoided an early death?

gomidog

Also, why keep comparing him to Jobs? It's not like it is a competition to determine who is the BEST PERSON EVAR in the History of Computer Science. Let us recognize their individual contributions and be thankful for what each did to advance technology.

Luke Burrage

Also, why keep comparing him to Jobs? It's not like it is a competition to determine who is the BEST PERSON EVAR in the History of Computer Science. Let us recognize their individual contributions and be thankful for what each did to advance technology.

I only compared him to Jobs after the sneering tone of the opening post. I've no idea who "a1s" is but there was a bit of high horse riding going on, looking down at us for starting a thread about Jobs and not about Ritchie. As it happens we did all know about his death, and it had been mentioned in an appropriate thread many days earlier. I just explained why Jobs had a much larger impact in the news.

Luke Burrage

Seriously? How would you feel if people didn't care about your juggling (that's what you do, right? It would be embarrassing if you're actually some sort of Nobel laureate, who I only know for his side activities...), just because you avoided an early death?

Old jugglers die all the time. Some of the most famous warrant an obituary in the Times, but most don't. There is usually a bit of upset I the juggling community, but nothing too bad. Old jugglers have usually already ritired, and have had all their greatest contributions behind them. Such is life.

But when a young juggler dies, or commits suicide? It's a big deal! Back in 2004 an American juggler called Sean McKinney committed suicide, and people still talk about him today. And many juggling conventions have awards or prizes dedicated to the memory of young jugglers who died in the military, or when doing charity work in a dangerous part of the world, or who died in a car crash. These young guys had much more to contribute to the world and were cut down in their prime.


It makes a huge difference.

a1s

I only compared him to Jobs after the sneering tone of the opening post. I've no idea who "a1s" is but there was a bit of high horse riding going on, looking down at us for starting a thread about Jobs and not about Ritchie. As it happens we did all know about his death, and it had been mentioned in an appropriate thread many days earlier. I just explained why Jobs had a much larger impact in the news.

I actually did a search to find out if this was reported earlier. It came up empty, because his name was misspelled (as "Richie", which is understandable if done from memory). As for high-horsedness, I though it was pretty obvious I was writing... shall we say "from experience".
Anyway, I guess I overdid it with the Clippits, and I apologize humbly for my over-eagerness. It's just that with all the media frenzy about Jobs (he was even mentioned on a radio program about linguistics!), I didn't want to see dmr ignored.


P.S.

I've no idea who "a1s" is

And I have a pretty good idea which juggler's obituary I'm not writing ;-)