Computer pioneer Niklaus Wirth passed away on January 1, 2024 at the age of almost 90. The long-time ETH professor of computer science became world-famous for developing the Pascal programming language in 1970. In 1984, he was the only German-speaking computer scientist to receive the Turing Award, which is considered the Nobel Prize for computer science.
04.01.2024 by Pauline Lüthi, Florian Meyer
He was a Turing Award winner, computer pioneer and inventor of influential programming languages: Niklaus Wirth's achievements and accomplishments for computer science are far-reaching. He is probably best known for developing the Pascal programming language. However, his impact is not limited to Pascal. With his work and passion, Niklaus Wirth made fundamental contributions to the development of computer science worldwide. To this day, his achievements have had a decisive influence on computer science and generations of programmers. According to his family, Niklaus Wirth passed away peacefully on January 1, 2024.
Niklaus Wirth played a key role in establishing computer science in Switzerland. He managed to bring computer science innovations from the USA, the leading country in computer development at the time, to Switzerland and to help computer science achieve a breakthrough as a separate field of research and profession in this country, as ETH President Joël Mesot recalls: "In Niklaus Wirth, ETH Zurich is losing one of its greats, who not only did pioneering work in the development of programming languages, but was also one of the founding fathers of computer science in Switzerland and at ETH." Niklaus Wirth was a professor at ETH Zurich from 1968 to 1999. It was thanks to his persistence and that of his colleagues that ETH Zurich was given an independent Department of Computer Science and the associated degree program in 1981.
Early passion for technology
Born in Winterthur on February 15, 1934, Niklaus Wirth's enthusiasm for technology was already evident in his childhood, when he was intensively involved in aircraft construction and built his first radios and amplifiers. His passion led him to ETH Zurich as a student. He studied electrical engineering and graduated with a degree in electrical engineering. Wirth completed his Master's degree at the University of Laval in Canada in 1960. He first came into contact with computers, programming languages and compilers at the University of California in Berkeley. It was there that he entered the software field and in 1963 he completed his doctorate in Berkeley under Harry Huskey on the generalization of the Algol 60 programming language.
After assistant professorships at Stanford University and the University of Zurich, he returned to ETH Zurich in 1968 as Professor of Computer Science, where he taught and researched as Professor of Computer Science until 1999. In the years 1976 to 1977 and 1984 to 1985, he spent time studying at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC).
During 31 years at ETH Zurich, Niklaus Wirth developed new programming languages such as Euler, PL360, Algol W, Pascal, Modula, Modula 2, Oberon and LoLa. He also built the first personal computers (PCs) in Switzerland and trained the first generation of Swiss computer scientists. Last but not least, he wrote several standard works that have been translated worldwide. He received numerous honors, including the prestigious ACM Turing Award, which he won in 1984 as the first and so far only German-speaking computer scientist. In 1988 he received the IEEE Computer Pioneer Award. Wirth's Law, according to which software slows down faster than hardware speeds up, is named after him.
Pascal - and the search for a powerful and simple language
1984 was a special year for Niklaus Wirth, for computer science and for the spread of the personal computer: Apple introduced the Macintosh PC, IBM presented its IBM Personal Computer/AT and Niklaus Wirth won the Turing Award - the highest prize in computer science, comparable to a Nobel Prize in the natural sciences or the Fields Medal in mathematics. Wirth received the award for the development of several programming languages, including Euler, Algol W, Modula and especially Pascal.
Niklaus Wirth's most famous work is the programming language Pascal. Its main advantage is its simplicity and elegance. Pascal is based on the clear principles of structural programming formulated by the computer scientist Edsger W. Dijkstra, on a mathematical basis laid down by the computer scientist Tony Hoare, and on Niklaus Wirth's architectural implementation of the Algol W ideas. This efficient language combined good programming practices with structured programming and data structuring. As a result, it quickly became a popular teaching language. Several generations of students at universities around the world - including ETH Zurich - had their first programming experience with Pascal.
Niklaus Wirth was never one to rest on his laurels - on the contrary. Pascal may be his best-known achievement, but his work goes much further: from the successor language Modula-2, to the Oberon system and the "Lilith" workstation, a forerunner of later personal computers. Further developing and improving his programming languages was a lifelong project for Wirth. What began with Euler ultimately ended with Oberon, a language with the object orientation concept and type hierarchy, which was intended to be as powerful as possible and as simple as possible at the same time. Niklaus Wirth wanted to invent something for the general public, in line with the principle: economical and understandable.
Oberon was not just a language. The result was an entire system and, in the end, the book "Project Oberon" was published, in which the software, language and hardware are described on around 500 pages - the pride and joy of his work: "Throughout my life, I pursued the goal of developing a language that was as powerful as possible but as simple as possible. Oberon is the final link in this development chain," said Niklaus Wirth.
Lilith - and the commitment to computer science in Switzerland
Today, Switzerland plays an important role in computer science worldwide and makes many fundamental contributions to the foundations and their application. Things looked different until the 1970s: While the first workstations had already been developed in the USA and computer science was widespread as a field of study, Switzerland lagged behind in education and application. One example of this is Wirth's Lilith, which only aroused the interest of industry years later.
Niklaus Wirth in front of Lilith, one of the first computer workstations with a graphic screen and a mouse
Niklaus Wirth in 1984, when he won the prestigious Turing Award. To his left is "Lilith", one of the first computer workstations with a graphic screen and mouse and the forerunner of today's personal computers. (Image: Niklaus Wirth)
Lilith was one of the world's first computer workstations with a high-resolution graphic screen and a mouse, and a precursor to today's personal computers. Niklaus Wirth developed it at ETH in 1980 as a platform for numerous software projects in research. From 1982, ETH researchers attempted to market the system, but were unsuccessful. The industrial development of the PC took place in the USA. However, Lilith influenced an entire generation of computer scientists. After Lilith, Niklaus Wirth developed another computer system, Ceres, in 1986, including the Oberon operating system and Oberon programming language. Ceres computers were used to train computer science students at ETH Zurich until around 2003.
The path to establishing computer science at ETH and in Switzerland was not straightforward either: Niklaus Wirth and his companions first had to overcome a number of hurdles. As early as the beginning of the 1970s, they launched an attempt to introduce computer science as a separate field of study. However, this failed, as did a second attempt. However, when the shortage of computer scientists in Switzerland became apparent, ETH Zurich definitively introduced computer science as a department and a degree program in 1981. Thanks to the commitment of Niklaus Wirth and his colleagues, a foundation stone was laid for the rise of computer science in Switzerland.
Funeral service on January 11, 2024
The funeral service for Niklaus Wirth will take place on Thursday, January 11, 2024 at 15:30 in the Kulturhaus Helferei at Kirchgasse 13 in Zurich.
Personal insights into the life of the computer pioneer
To mark the 40th anniversary of the Department of Computer Science at ETH, Niklaus Wirth gave personal insights into his history and what moved him in his life and research career in a series of videos in 2021.
Here is a translation by https://www.deepl.com:
The computer pioneer Niklaus Wirth has died
Computer pioneer Niklaus Wirth passed away on January 1, 2024 at the age of almost 90. The long-time ETH professor of computer science became world-famous for developing the Pascal programming language in 1970. In 1984, he was the only German-speaking computer scientist to receive the Turing Award, which is considered the Nobel Prize for computer science.
04.01.2024 by Pauline Lüthi, Florian Meyer
He was a Turing Award winner, computer pioneer and inventor of influential programming languages: Niklaus Wirth's achievements and accomplishments for computer science are far-reaching. He is probably best known for developing the Pascal programming language. However, his impact is not limited to Pascal. With his work and passion, Niklaus Wirth made fundamental contributions to the development of computer science worldwide. To this day, his achievements have had a decisive influence on computer science and generations of programmers. According to his family, Niklaus Wirth passed away peacefully on January 1, 2024.
Niklaus Wirth played a key role in establishing computer science in Switzerland. He managed to bring computer science innovations from the USA, the leading country in computer development at the time, to Switzerland and to help computer science achieve a breakthrough as a separate field of research and profession in this country, as ETH President Joël Mesot recalls: "In Niklaus Wirth, ETH Zurich is losing one of its greats, who not only did pioneering work in the development of programming languages, but was also one of the founding fathers of computer science in Switzerland and at ETH." Niklaus Wirth was a professor at ETH Zurich from 1968 to 1999. It was thanks to his persistence and that of his colleagues that ETH Zurich was given an independent Department of Computer Science and the associated degree program in 1981.
Early passion for technology
Born in Winterthur on February 15, 1934, Niklaus Wirth's enthusiasm for technology was already evident in his childhood, when he was intensively involved in aircraft construction and built his first radios and amplifiers. His passion led him to ETH Zurich as a student. He studied electrical engineering and graduated with a degree in electrical engineering. Wirth completed his Master's degree at the University of Laval in Canada in 1960. He first came into contact with computers, programming languages and compilers at the University of California in Berkeley. It was there that he entered the software field and in 1963 he completed his doctorate in Berkeley under Harry Huskey on the generalization of the Algol 60 programming language.
After assistant professorships at Stanford University and the University of Zurich, he returned to ETH Zurich in 1968 as Professor of Computer Science, where he taught and researched as Professor of Computer Science until 1999. In the years 1976 to 1977 and 1984 to 1985, he spent time studying at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC).
During 31 years at ETH Zurich, Niklaus Wirth developed new programming languages such as Euler, PL360, Algol W, Pascal, Modula, Modula 2, Oberon and LoLa. He also built the first personal computers (PCs) in Switzerland and trained the first generation of Swiss computer scientists. Last but not least, he wrote several standard works that have been translated worldwide. He received numerous honors, including the prestigious ACM Turing Award, which he won in 1984 as the first and so far only German-speaking computer scientist. In 1988 he received the IEEE Computer Pioneer Award. Wirth's Law, according to which software slows down faster than hardware speeds up, is named after him.
Pascal - and the search for a powerful and simple language
1984 was a special year for Niklaus Wirth, for computer science and for the spread of the personal computer: Apple introduced the Macintosh PC, IBM presented its IBM Personal Computer/AT and Niklaus Wirth won the Turing Award - the highest prize in computer science, comparable to a Nobel Prize in the natural sciences or the Fields Medal in mathematics. Wirth received the award for the development of several programming languages, including Euler, Algol W, Modula and especially Pascal.
Niklaus Wirth's most famous work is the programming language Pascal. Its main advantage is its simplicity and elegance. Pascal is based on the clear principles of structural programming formulated by the computer scientist Edsger W. Dijkstra, on a mathematical basis laid down by the computer scientist Tony Hoare, and on Niklaus Wirth's architectural implementation of the Algol W ideas. This efficient language combined good programming practices with structured programming and data structuring. As a result, it quickly became a popular teaching language. Several generations of students at universities around the world - including ETH Zurich - had their first programming experience with Pascal.
Niklaus Wirth was never one to rest on his laurels - on the contrary. Pascal may be his best-known achievement, but his work goes much further: from the successor language Modula-2, to the Oberon system and the "Lilith" workstation, a forerunner of later personal computers. Further developing and improving his programming languages was a lifelong project for Wirth. What began with Euler ultimately ended with Oberon, a language with the object orientation concept and type hierarchy, which was intended to be as powerful as possible and as simple as possible at the same time. Niklaus Wirth wanted to invent something for the general public, in line with the principle: economical and understandable.
Oberon was not just a language. The result was an entire system and, in the end, the book "Project Oberon" was published, in which the software, language and hardware are described on around 500 pages - the pride and joy of his work: "Throughout my life, I pursued the goal of developing a language that was as powerful as possible but as simple as possible. Oberon is the final link in this development chain," said Niklaus Wirth.
Lilith - and the commitment to computer science in Switzerland
Today, Switzerland plays an important role in computer science worldwide and makes many fundamental contributions to the foundations and their application. Things looked different until the 1970s: While the first workstations had already been developed in the USA and computer science was widespread as a field of study, Switzerland lagged behind in education and application. One example of this is Wirth's Lilith, which only aroused the interest of industry years later. Niklaus Wirth in front of Lilith, one of the first computer workstations with a graphic screen and a mouse Niklaus Wirth in 1984, when he won the prestigious Turing Award. To his left is "Lilith", one of the first computer workstations with a graphic screen and mouse and the forerunner of today's personal computers. (Image: Niklaus Wirth)
Lilith was one of the world's first computer workstations with a high-resolution graphic screen and a mouse, and a precursor to today's personal computers. Niklaus Wirth developed it at ETH in 1980 as a platform for numerous software projects in research. From 1982, ETH researchers attempted to market the system, but were unsuccessful. The industrial development of the PC took place in the USA. However, Lilith influenced an entire generation of computer scientists. After Lilith, Niklaus Wirth developed another computer system, Ceres, in 1986, including the Oberon operating system and Oberon programming language. Ceres computers were used to train computer science students at ETH Zurich until around 2003.
The path to establishing computer science at ETH and in Switzerland was not straightforward either: Niklaus Wirth and his companions first had to overcome a number of hurdles. As early as the beginning of the 1970s, they launched an attempt to introduce computer science as a separate field of study. However, this failed, as did a second attempt. However, when the shortage of computer scientists in Switzerland became apparent, ETH Zurich definitively introduced computer science as a department and a degree program in 1981. Thanks to the commitment of Niklaus Wirth and his colleagues, a foundation stone was laid for the rise of computer science in Switzerland.
Funeral service on January 11, 2024
The funeral service for Niklaus Wirth will take place on Thursday, January 11, 2024 at 15:30 in the Kulturhaus Helferei at Kirchgasse 13 in Zurich.
Personal insights into the life of the computer pioneer
To mark the 40th anniversary of the Department of Computer Science at ETH, Niklaus Wirth gave personal insights into his history and what moved him in his life and research career in a series of videos in 2021.
https://inf.ethz.ch/de/news-und-veranstaltungen/spotlights/i...
https://inf.ethz.ch/de/news-und-veranstaltungen/spotlights/i...
https://inf.ethz.ch/de/news-und-veranstaltungen/spotlights/i...
https://inf.ethz.ch/de/news-und-veranstaltungen/spotlights/i...