
The Writings of Leslie Lamport - kaymanb
https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html
======
ahelwer
I actually read through all of these (the summaries, not the papers) in the
process of writing the TLA+ wikipedia article. Some favorites:

* On the oft-misunderstood significance of the bakery algorithm: [https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#bakery](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#bakery)

* On submitting an algorithm with a bug in it, thus arousing interest in verifying concurrent algorithms (culminating decades later in the development of TLA+): [https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#proving](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#proving)

* On how nobody has actually read his most famous paper ( _Time, Clocks..._ ): [https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#time-clocks](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#time-clocks)

* Hanging out, drinking beer at Dijkstra's house: [https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#new-approac...](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#new-approach)

* On creating the first (impractical) digital signature algorithm: [https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#dig-sig](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#dig-sig)

* A several-times-rejected paper which then became one of the most cited in the field of temporal logic: [https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#sometime](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#sometime)

* A lifelong source of fascination, the arbiter problem: [https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#buridan](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#buridan)

* The creation of LaTeX: [https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#latex](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#latex)

* On presenting the first paxos paper in an Indiana Jones outfit, to widespread incomprehension: [https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#lamport-pax...](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#lamport-paxos)

I'll stop here because basically every single summary is fun and worth
reading.

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kaymanb
The comments, anecdotes, and historical context he gives the papers are by
themselves a great read, especially if you're even somewhat familiar with the
results. The comments on #12, which introduces the Bakery Algorithm [1] are a
great example of this.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamport%27s_bakery_algorithm](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamport%27s_bakery_algorithm)

~~~
emmelaich
There are great bits in the papers, too. For instance in the Buridan paper ...

> _An empirical absence of dead asses does not invalidate Buridan’s Principle_

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mjb
"What Good is Temporal Logic?"
([https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#what-
good](https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/pubs.html#what-good)) is in the
running for my favorite CS paper. Well worth reading, and understandable even
if you have a passing familiarity with predicate logic.

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btrettel
This page make me want to write some narratives about my own papers. Maybe I
wouldn't release the narratives, but Lamport's page made me realize how much
detail is lost to time. The context of the papers is interesting and maybe
even relevant to the research.

~~~
onemoresoop
Interesting how that makes me think of state in programming. Maybe theres a
way to encapsulate state in these papers to capture as much as possible from
the context.

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User23
This reminds me very much of the Dijkstra archive[1]. I look forward to
reading all of these as I did with those (the Dutch language ones excepted).

[1]
[https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/](https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/)

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redis_mlc
If you're more into web design than math, check out that spartan HTML ... it's
pre-Geocities, if that's possible.

Didn't know that the title element would render fine even inside body!

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astn-austin
Well now here go with the good coffee shop reading!

~~~
mikhailfranco
Mathematical papers seem to require coffee for their production [1] and their
consumption.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfr%C3%A9d_R%C3%A9nyi#Quotati...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfr%C3%A9d_R%C3%A9nyi#Quotations)

