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Saturday, 23 October 2021

Chapter 22 // Exercise 1, 2, 3, 4 - Principles & Practice Using C++

I thought about not doing these written exercises, however the entire chapter is about learning about history so you don't make the same mistakes/understand what came before and how that influences the present.

I actually enjoyed looking up all these random people. Well not all of them are random (I'd heard of most of the computer scientists) but the non-scientists were more interesting.

Chapter 22 // Exercise 1

Define programming.

Github: N/A

I would say programming is the art of making a computer do what you want.

Chapter 22 // Exercise 2

Define programming language.

Github: N/A

Using page 807, a programming language is many but most notably a tool for making the computer do what you want. There are many different languages that do different things but having standards for those languages allows effective communication between programmers. I used to be a flight attendant for Emirates. The global aviation language is English; when flying, relaying instructions etc., it is imperative you speak English so everyone is on the same page.

Chapter 22 // Exercise 3

Go through the book and look at chapter vignettes. Which were from computer scientists? Write one paragraph summarising what each of those scientists contributed.

Github: N/A

Well I'm not writing a paragraph...later on he wants 10-20 page reports on C++....ain't nobody got time for that.

Chapter 2 - Brian Kernighan; Canadian computer scientist that contributed to the development of Unix and C (and many other things).

Chapter 4 - Gerald Weinberg; American computer scientist who specialised in the psychology and anthropology of computer software development.

Chapter 5 - Maurice Wilkes; British computer scientist who designed and helped build the Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (one of the earliest stored program computers) and invented microprogramming.

Chapter 6 - Kristen Nygaard; Norwegian computer scientist who is the co-inventor of object-oriented programming and Simula.

Chapter 13 - Alan Perlis? This chapter says traditional however google says Alan Perlis but it isn't sure. Anyway he was an American computer Scientist and was the first recipient of the Turing Award.

Chapter 17 - Alex Stepanov is a Russian-American computer programmer best known as the primary designer and implementer of the C++ Standard template library.

Chapter 20 - Douglas McIlroy is an American (?) mathematician, engineer and programmer. He participated in the design of many influential languages (including C++) and is still a professor at the age of 89.

Chapter 21 - Trygve Reenskaug is a Norwegian computer scientist who formulated the model-view-controller patter for graphical user interface software design.

Chapter 22 - Alan Perlis. See Chapter 13 description.

Chapter 26 - Donald Knuth is an American computer scientist and called "the father of analysis of algorithms).

Chapter 27 - Dennis Ritchie was an American computer scientist and co-creator of the C programming language (amongst many other things).

Chapter 22 // Exercise 4

Go through the book and look at chapter vignettes. Which ones were not from computer scientists? Identify the country of origin and field of work in each.

Github: N/A

Chapter 0 (Switzerland?) - Swiss army proverb . I google this and it came up with many other books also using this quote in their chapter vignettes but couldn't actually find a source for it.

Chapter 1 (USA) - R A Heinlein is a Science Fiction author and this quote is from the "Competent man". Apparently a competent human should be able to do such things as "build a wall", "pitch manure", "solve equations, "butcher a hog", "die gallantly" amongst other things....

Chapter 3 (France) - Louis Pasteur was a French chemist and microbiologist renowned for discoveries of the principles of vaccination, fermentation and pasteurisation...I actually found this very interesting. I guess Pasteur is where the word pasteurisation comes from.

Chapter 7 (USA?) - First recorded use was Dallas Morning News in 1976 apparently.

Chapter 8 (USA?) - It says "traditional" in the book but google attributes this quote to Marion J. Levy Jr who was an American sociologist noted for his work on modernisation theory.

Chapter 9 (Denmark) - Peit Hein was a Danish polymath. He also invented the Soma cube and the board game Hex.

Chapter 10 (USA) - Richard Feynman was an American theoretical physicist known for many things made out of big words. He looks more like a Hollywood actor than a scientist.

Chapter 11 (Germany) - Albert Einstein was a German theoretical physicist who practically invented all physics (I'm exaggerating but he made a lot of contributions). I had no idea that he died in 1955, I thought it was much later.

Chapter 12 (USA) - Calvin and Hobbes was a daily American comic strip that I had never heard of until researching this. I literally put "Calvin's dad" into google and it knew exactly what I was talking about. Google says it's cited as "the last great comic newspaper". Clearly they had never heard of Garfield.

Chapter 14 (Roman Republic) - A Roman author, architect and civil/military engineer during the 1st century BC.

Chapter 18 (?) - Caveat Emptor is apparently a Latin phrase that means "let the buyer beware".

Chapter 15 (France) - His actual name is Francois-Marie Arouet (quite possible one the Frenchest names I've encountered) and was born 1694. He was an French "enlightenment" writer. I'm guessing that's not to do with new age stuff but more philosophy. 

Chapter 16 (USA) - Nicholas Negroponte is a Greek-American architect and stupidly rich.

Chapter 19 (UK) - Winston Churchill was the Prime Minister of the UK from 1940 till 1945.

Chapter 23 (USA) - Errol Morris is an American film director known for documentaries. 
 
Chapter 24 (USA) - Henry Louis Mencken was an American Journalist.

Chapter 25 - Pretty sure Bjarne made this one up.

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