Artifact Details

Title

Lampson, Butler oral history

Catalog Number

102658024

Type

Document

Description

Butler Lampson's long career covers a remarkable range of topics, including computer architecture, local area networks, raster printers, page description languages, operating systems, programming languages and their semantics, fault-tolerant computing, transaction processing, computer security, and WYSIWYG editors. He is also widely admired as a technical leader.

Lampson holds an A.B. degree in Physics (Harvard, 1964) and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (UC Berkeley, 1967).

Working with colleagues, he designed the Alto personal workstation, the Ethernet local area network, an encryption system for Ethernet, the Bravo text editor, the Interpress page description language, and dozens of groundbreaking computer architectures and systems including the SDS 940 timesharing system and the Xerox PARC 'Dorado' computer.

Lampson has taught at the University of California at Berkeley, and was a major contributor at the Computer Science Laboratory at Xerox PARC and at Digital Equipment Corporation's Systems Research Center.

He holds, individually or with others, 23 patents relating to networks, security, raster printing, and transaction processing.

Date

2006-08-22

Contributor

Kay, Alan C., Interviewer
Lampson, Butler W., Interviewee

Publisher

Computer History Museum

Place of Publication

Cambridge, Massachusetts

Extent

74 p.

Category

Transcription

Subject

Lampson, Butler; Computer architecture; Local area networks(Computer networks); Raster printers; Page description languages; Operating systems (Computers); Programming languages (Electronic computers); Semantics; Fault-tolerant computing; Transaction processing; Computer security; WYSIWYG editors; Alto personal workstation; Ethernet (Local area network system); Ethernet encryption system; Bravo text editor; Interpress page description language; SDS 940 timesharing system; Xerox Dorado; Xerox PARC Computer Science Laboratory (CSL); Digital Equipment Corporation Systems Research Center; Transaction processing; Fellow Award Honoree

Collection Title

CHM Oral History Collection

Lot Number

X3697.2007