Andrew S. Tanenbaum

From Free net encyclopedia

Dr. Andrew Stuart "Andy" Tanenbaum (born 1944) is a professor of Computer Science at Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam in the Netherlands. He is best known as the author of Minix, a free Unix-like operating system for teaching purposes, and for his computer science textbooks. He regards his teaching job as his most important work.<ref name=teach>2004 article about Linux, the Usenet debate, and the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution</ref> Image:AndrewTanenbaum.JPG

He was born in New York City and raised in White Plains, NY. He received his bachelor's degree in Physics from MIT in 1965. [1] He received his doctorate in physics from UC Berkeley in 1971. He and his wife moved to the Netherlands (her homeland), but he retains his United States citizenship. As of 2004 he teaches courses about Computer Organization and Operating Systems, and supervises the work of Ph.D. candidates.

He is well recognized for his textbooks on computer science, which are famous as standard texts in the field, particularly:

Computer Networks, ISBN 0130661023
Operating Systems: Design and Implementation, ISBN 0136386776
Modern Operating Systems, ISBN 0130313580

He also wrote:

Structured Computer Organization, ISBN 0131485210
Distributed Systems: Principles and Paradigms, ISBN 0130888931

Operating Systems: Design and Implementation and Minix were Linus Torvalds' inspiration for the Linux kernel. In his autobiography Just For Fun, Torvalds describes it as "the book that launched me to new heights". Tanenbaum started a famous, inflammatory Usenet discussion with Torvalds [2] about the microkernel, but Linus and Andrew appear to be on good speaking terms; Linus wants it understood that he holds no animosity towards Tanenbaum. Tanenbaum went on to write the Amoeba distributed operating system, making full use of the microkernel idea. Tanenbaum's adherence to the elegance of the microkernel architecture is now appearing prophetic, as more and more of the critical computing components of our society are moving to microkernel-based designs. Examples include the world's most powerful core router, the Cisco Systems CRS-1, which is based on the QNX microkernel, as well as the vast majority of in-vehicle computing (also based on the QNX microkernel).

In 2004 Tanenbaum created electoral-vote.com, a popular web site analyzing opinion polls for the 2004 U.S. Presidential Election, using them to project the outcome in the Electoral College. The site also provided an electoral map. Surprising results on this map (such as, for example, a short period when Hawaii, traditionally Democratic, was listed as "Barely Bush") would often surface in popular discussion. Through most of the campaign period he kept his identity secret, referring to himself as "the Votemaster" and acknowledging only that he personally preferred Kerry. Tanenbaum, a Democrat, revealed his identity on November 1, 2004, the day prior to the election, also stating his reasons and qualifications for running the website [3].

[edit]