5 ms·

Donald E. Knuth's Homepage

29 points by dorkwood 2y ago

azangru 2y ago
What's with those Chinese names (see both https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/faq.html#asian https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/faq.html#asian and https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/vita.pdf https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/vita.pdf)? Why did they become part of his identity?
- nolamark 2y ago
  My guess it is partially addressed in the Non-Latin names section of the "Help Wanted" section. ...because I want to celebrate the fact that computer science is a fantastic worldwide enterprise. https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/help.html https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/help.html
- groovy2shoes 2y ago
  What do you mean? It says it right there on the FAQ: > 高德纳 is my Chinese name, given to me in 1977 by Frances Yao. A quick search indicates that Frances Yao is a colleague of Knuth's: > Frances Foong Chu Yao (Chinese: 儲楓; pinyin: Chǔ Fēng) is a Taiwanese-American mathematician and theoretical computer scientist. [1] As for why someone might assume a Chinese name, consider how many Chinese people in our industry assume Western names for the sake of working with us. Perhaps he's just returning the favor. It might also be compared to linguistic accomodation. [2] [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Yao https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Yao [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_accommodation_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_accommodation_th...
EternalFury 2y ago
My hero! I would never have stayed in “computer things” had I not read Donald’s volumes.
programjames 2y ago
Knuth is so famous that Google translates his Chinese name as "Knuth" rather than a literal translation.
tromp 2y ago
Last month, Knuth was playing with an Othello program written in CWEB [1]. for (k=0;k<8;k++) @<If direction |k| allows a move, |return 1|; otherwise |continue|@>; return 0; This part looks confusing. There must be some actual code in the loop body, but it all looks like pseudo code?! How does CWEB process this? [1] https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/programs/othello.w https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/programs/othello....
- justinsaccount 2y ago
  It's right below that: @ @<If direction |k| allows a move, |return 1|; otherwise |continue|@>= { for (ii=i+deli[k],jj=j+delj[k],l=0;board[ii][jj]>=0; ...
- cxr 2y ago
  Knuth got the memo—he wrote a well-known rejoinder to it; it's not surprising to find him using goto.
  - Jtsummers 2y ago
    https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/356635.356640 https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/356635.356640 Structured Programming with go to Statements, Knuth, 1974
- Jtsummers 2y ago
  https://ctan.org/pkg/cweb?lang=en https://ctan.org/pkg/cweb?lang=en - This has some reference documentation. @< ... @> provides a section name. In text rendered form these become references, in code blocks when the code is generated it'll substitute in the referenced code.
- svat 2y ago
  This is the original Knuth-style "literate programming", and being able to do this is approximately the entire point of CWEB. BTW, note that the .w source file is not meant to be read directly: it is intended to be run through cweave (which generates a .tex file), and then typeset. In this case, I have a (not very up-to-date) repo at https://github.com/shreevatsa/knuth-literate-programs https://github.com/shreevatsa/knuth-literate-programs of the literate programs from Knuth's website, and othello.pdf is here: https://shreevatsa.github.io/knuth-literate-programs/programs/othello.pdf https://shreevatsa.github.io/knuth-literate-programs/program... You're referring to section 4 of the program, which occurs at the bottom of page 2 here: https://shreevatsa.github.io/knuth-literate-programs/programs/othello.pdf#page=2 https://shreevatsa.github.io/knuth-literate-programs/program... — in the typeset version, the text "If direction k allows a move, return 1; otherwise continue" is followed by the number 5, which means that the contents are in section 5 of the program. If you go to section 5 which is at the top of the next page (if viewing the PDF on a screen, you can simply click on the 5), you'll see the contents of the section (followed by "This code is used in section 4"). (It's also possible to define some code across multiple sections, e.g. the "<Subroutines 3>;" referenced in section 1 is defined across sections 3, 4, 6. All these conventions may seem unnecessary for a small program but they were devised for the medium-length (~20k lines) Pascal program TeX: https://mirrors.ctan.org/info/knuth-pdf/tex/tex.pdf https://mirrors.ctan.org/info/knuth-pdf/tex/tex.pdf and it's how Knuth now finds it most comfortable to program for programs of any length.) (How does CWEB process this: ctangle replaces the text with the body of the loop; you could think of the entire `If direction |k| allows a move, |return 1|; otherwise |continue|` as a parameter-less macro with a long name, which is replaced by the preprocessor.)
deleted 2y ago
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jack_riminton 2y ago
I like the fact that he doesn’t use email anymore. If I got to his level the first thing I’d do would be to hire an assistant to deal with all phone calls, emails and letters

29 points by dorkwood 2y ago

What's with those Chinese names (see both https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/faq.html#asian https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/faq.html#asian and https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/vita.pdf https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/vita.pdf)? Why did they become part of his identity?

nolamark 2y ago
My guess it is partially addressed in the Non-Latin names section of the "Help Wanted" section. ...because I want to celebrate the fact that computer science is a fantastic worldwide enterprise. https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/help.html https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/help.html
groovy2shoes 2y ago
What do you mean? It says it right there on the FAQ: > 高德纳 is my Chinese name, given to me in 1977 by Frances Yao. A quick search indicates that Frances Yao is a colleague of Knuth's: > Frances Foong Chu Yao (Chinese: 儲楓; pinyin: Chǔ Fēng) is a Taiwanese-American mathematician and theoretical computer scientist. [1] As for why someone might assume a Chinese name, consider how many Chinese people in our industry assume Western names for the sake of working with us. Perhaps he's just returning the favor. It might also be compared to linguistic accomodation. [2] [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Yao https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Yao [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_accommodation_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_accommodation_th...

EternalFury 2y ago

My hero! I would never have stayed in “computer things” had I not read Donald’s volumes.

programjames 2y ago

Knuth is so famous that Google translates his Chinese name as "Knuth" rather than a literal translation.

tromp 2y ago

Last month, Knuth was playing with an Othello program written in CWEB [1]. for (k=0;k<8;k++) @<If direction |k| allows a move, |return 1|; otherwise |continue|@>; return 0; This part looks confusing. There must be some actual code in the loop body, but it all looks like pseudo code?! How does CWEB process this? [1] https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/programs/othello.w https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/programs/othello....

justinsaccount 2y ago
It's right below that: @ @<If direction |k| allows a move, |return 1|; otherwise |continue|@>= { for (ii=i+deli[k],jj=j+delj[k],l=0;board[ii][jj]>=0; ...
cxr 2y ago
Knuth got the memo—he wrote a well-known rejoinder to it; it's not surprising to find him using goto.
- Jtsummers 2y ago
  https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/356635.356640 https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/356635.356640 Structured Programming with go to Statements, Knuth, 1974
Jtsummers 2y ago
https://ctan.org/pkg/cweb?lang=en https://ctan.org/pkg/cweb?lang=en - This has some reference documentation. @< ... @> provides a section name. In text rendered form these become references, in code blocks when the code is generated it'll substitute in the referenced code.
svat 2y ago
This is the original Knuth-style "literate programming", and being able to do this is approximately the entire point of CWEB. BTW, note that the .w source file is not meant to be read directly: it is intended to be run through cweave (which generates a .tex file), and then typeset. In this case, I have a (not very up-to-date) repo at https://github.com/shreevatsa/knuth-literate-programs https://github.com/shreevatsa/knuth-literate-programs of the literate programs from Knuth's website, and othello.pdf is here: https://shreevatsa.github.io/knuth-literate-programs/programs/othello.pdf https://shreevatsa.github.io/knuth-literate-programs/program... You're referring to section 4 of the program, which occurs at the bottom of page 2 here: https://shreevatsa.github.io/knuth-literate-programs/programs/othello.pdf#page=2 https://shreevatsa.github.io/knuth-literate-programs/program... — in the typeset version, the text "If direction k allows a move, return 1; otherwise continue" is followed by the number 5, which means that the contents are in section 5 of the program. If you go to section 5 which is at the top of the next page (if viewing the PDF on a screen, you can simply click on the 5), you'll see the contents of the section (followed by "This code is used in section 4"). (It's also possible to define some code across multiple sections, e.g. the "<Subroutines 3>;" referenced in section 1 is defined across sections 3, 4, 6. All these conventions may seem unnecessary for a small program but they were devised for the medium-length (~20k lines) Pascal program TeX: https://mirrors.ctan.org/info/knuth-pdf/tex/tex.pdf https://mirrors.ctan.org/info/knuth-pdf/tex/tex.pdf and it's how Knuth now finds it most comfortable to program for programs of any length.) (How does CWEB process this: ctangle replaces the text with the body of the loop; you could think of the entire `If direction |k| allows a move, |return 1|; otherwise |continue|` as a parameter-less macro with a long name, which is replaced by the preprocessor.)

deleted 2y ago

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jack_riminton 2y ago

I like the fact that he doesn’t use email anymore. If I got to his level the first thing I’d do would be to hire an assistant to deal with all phone calls, emails and letters