It's rather unfortunate that this comes so late. Gary Kildall received far less recognition than he was due during his lifetime, and a story -- by all appearances, unfounded -- regarding his sloppy handling of the IBM deal was pushed, mainly for PR reasons, by a lot of tech "journalists" along with the likes of Bill Gates himself. Perhaps even more ironically -- considering IEEE's distinction now -- is that his own alma mater treated him rather unceremoniously, famously inviting him to attend their CS program anniversary in 1992, but asking Gates, a dropout from a rival university, to deliver the keynote speech. He apparently lapsed into alcoholism later in his life, which ended with a motorcycle accident.
I certainly applaud IEEE's initiative, but I cannot shake off that feeling of "too little, too late".
> Perhaps even more ironically -- considering IEEE's distinction now -- is that his own alma mater treated him rather unceremoniously, famously inviting him to attend their CS program anniversary in 1992, but asking Gates, a dropout from a rival university, to deliver the keynote speech.
Why is that ironic? Gates was already a celebrity in the Seattle area by 1992.
So was Kildall. It's ironic because U. Washington ignored its own alumni and failed to recognize his contribution;. things typically go the other way 'round -- universities encourage their students and highlight their alumnis' successes. The appearance given by this event -- that Kildall's work is acclaimed and recognized -- is largely contrary to the reality: IBM and MS went through significant efforts to relegate the importance of CP/M in their own designs, U. Washington gave him a backseat despite being one of the people who contributed most to the computer industry after graduating from their CS department, and the tremendous importance of his activity was largely ignored during his lifetime and afterwards.
As a UW CSE alum, it doesn't seem weird to me at all. Universities tend to gravitate toward rich famous people so they can get money for things like buildings. UW CSE is especially pragmatic.
I had a Sanyo CP/M machine in the early 80's. I couldn't believe how fast Turbo Pascal ran compared with the Pascal compiler on the DEC VAX 11/780's we had at school.
My first real experience on a computer with an operating system (that didn't just boot basic) was using CP/M on Z80-based computers. The CPU portion of the computer was huge by today's standards, but since the predominant floppy drives were all eight inches across (and only 180KB) you needed a lot of space.
I certainly applaud IEEE's initiative, but I cannot shake off that feeling of "too little, too late".