5 ms·

It's not true, obviously. I have been in DK's office, I have seen him read and write email.

by theaeolist 6y ago

cpach 6y ago
O_o
raister 6y ago
Which client does he use?
- treeman79 6y ago
  2 bar magnets. He reads emails one iota at a time
- raister 6y ago
  > My boss did his PhD at Stanford. The story goes that one day he walked straight into Knuth's office, while he had the door open. Knuth says "Oh dear, I seem to have made a mistake. Could you close the door please?". Boss closes the door. Knuth says "No, from the other side". Source: reddit
  - krypton2k 6y ago
    I think this was from an episode of The IT Crowd.
Fiveplus 6y ago
Having refuted the central point of this entire essay, why do you think he wrote this in the first place?
- richrichardsson 6y ago
  As a PR piece for why most email to him goes unanswered?
- aberseti 6y ago
  Like most people who say they're going to quit something he probably just started using it again when he realised it was useful and maybe even essential, and didn't bother to update this webpage. It's been 30 years after all.
  - formerly_proven 6y ago
    > Changed by: Ursula N. Owen, 8-Mar-1999
    - bshimmin 6y ago
      I was curious about this “Ursula N. Owen”, thinking perhaps she was an assistant of Knuth’s back in the 90s. It turns out that it’s a pseudonym sometimes used by Knuth himself, and is a reference to “U.N. Owen”, a character from And Then There Were None, a best-selling Agatha Christie novel first published in 1939 and one of the best-selling books of all time. The name “UN Owen” itself is a play on “unknown”, and I like to think of Donald chuckling to himself whenever he used that pseudonym. From the postscript on https://ryanwaggoner.substack.com/p/could-you-delete-your-email-account https://ryanwaggoner.substack.com/p/could-you-delete-your-em...
- jrochkind1 6y ago
  This was written a while ago. Can we figure out how long ago? Well, internet archive verifies it existed on the web in 1997. https://web.archive.org/web/19970526031736/https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/email.html https://web.archive.org/web/19970526031736/https://www-cs-fa...
letusknow123 6y ago
Any proof of this?
- cpach 6y ago
  Uhm, how would he prove that? He probably didn’t take a photo of the occurrence.
- dahart 6y ago
  A witness is proof, unless you have a specific reason to believe the witness is unreliable.
- theaeolist 6y ago
  I met DK when he was visiting my university. So "his" office was the office he was assigned when visiting. He is the most wonderful person you can imagine. He came to my office and he introduced himself in the most affable way. We socialised quite a lot for the duration of his visit. I went into his office because he wanted to show me some proofs on his whiteboard, that he was very excited about. There was a email client on the screen but I didn't pry, I just noticed it. Also, it is pretty much absurd to believe that someone who is on the faculty of a university, where all business is conducted via email, will not read email. Basically, what he is saying is that he will not read your email.
sys_64738 6y ago
Citation needed.
- krapp 6y ago
  You want a "citation" for someone's personal anecdote?
svat 6y ago
Over the last three years, I have sent 12 emails to him, at the two addresses mentioned on the page (all were bug reports, as he says that's the only kind of email he accepts). Of these, 11 were processed in the way indicated on the page: several weeks later, I got a reply in my (postal) mailbox, with Knuth's replies in pencil over a printout of my email. For the other one, I got a two-line reply by email, saying thanks and that an updated version had been uploaded. (This was a correction to a section he was writing, that I sent immediately after a talk he gave about it. Interestingly, the "from" address on the email was that of his secretary—who comes in once a week AFAIK—but signed "-- Don".) So I think the content on this page is still substantially true, with rare exceptions.

It's not true, obviously. I have been in DK's office, I have seen him read and write email.

cpach 6y ago

O_o

raister 6y ago

Which client does he use?

treeman79 6y ago
2 bar magnets. He reads emails one iota at a time
raister 6y ago
> My boss did his PhD at Stanford. The story goes that one day he walked straight into Knuth's office, while he had the door open. Knuth says "Oh dear, I seem to have made a mistake. Could you close the door please?". Boss closes the door. Knuth says "No, from the other side". Source: reddit
- krypton2k 6y ago
  I think this was from an episode of The IT Crowd.

Fiveplus 6y ago

Having refuted the central point of this entire essay, why do you think he wrote this in the first place?

richrichardsson 6y ago
As a PR piece for why most email to him goes unanswered?
aberseti 6y ago
Like most people who say they're going to quit something he probably just started using it again when he realised it was useful and maybe even essential, and didn't bother to update this webpage. It's been 30 years after all.
- formerly_proven 6y ago
  > Changed by: Ursula N. Owen, 8-Mar-1999
  - bshimmin 6y ago
    I was curious about this “Ursula N. Owen”, thinking perhaps she was an assistant of Knuth’s back in the 90s. It turns out that it’s a pseudonym sometimes used by Knuth himself, and is a reference to “U.N. Owen”, a character from And Then There Were None, a best-selling Agatha Christie novel first published in 1939 and one of the best-selling books of all time. The name “UN Owen” itself is a play on “unknown”, and I like to think of Donald chuckling to himself whenever he used that pseudonym. From the postscript on https://ryanwaggoner.substack.com/p/could-you-delete-your-email-account https://ryanwaggoner.substack.com/p/could-you-delete-your-em...
jrochkind1 6y ago
This was written a while ago. Can we figure out how long ago? Well, internet archive verifies it existed on the web in 1997. https://web.archive.org/web/19970526031736/https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/email.html https://web.archive.org/web/19970526031736/https://www-cs-fa...

letusknow123 6y ago

Any proof of this?

cpach 6y ago
Uhm, how would he prove that? He probably didn’t take a photo of the occurrence.
dahart 6y ago
A witness is proof, unless you have a specific reason to believe the witness is unreliable.
theaeolist 6y ago
I met DK when he was visiting my university. So "his" office was the office he was assigned when visiting. He is the most wonderful person you can imagine. He came to my office and he introduced himself in the most affable way. We socialised quite a lot for the duration of his visit. I went into his office because he wanted to show me some proofs on his whiteboard, that he was very excited about. There was a email client on the screen but I didn't pry, I just noticed it. Also, it is pretty much absurd to believe that someone who is on the faculty of a university, where all business is conducted via email, will not read email. Basically, what he is saying is that he will not read your email.

sys_64738 6y ago

Citation needed.

krapp 6y ago
You want a "citation" for someone's personal anecdote?

svat 6y ago

Over the last three years, I have sent 12 emails to him, at the two addresses mentioned on the page (all were bug reports, as he says that's the only kind of email he accepts). Of these, 11 were processed in the way indicated on the page: several weeks later, I got a reply in my (postal) mailbox, with Knuth's replies in pencil over a printout of my email. For the other one, I got a two-line reply by email, saying thanks and that an updated version had been uploaded. (This was a correction to a section he was writing, that I sent immediately after a talk he gave about it. Interestingly, the "from" address on the email was that of his secretary—who comes in once a week AFAIK—but signed "-- Don".) So I think the content on this page is still substantially true, with rare exceptions.