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Gordon Bell has died

arstechnica.com

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Re: Gordon Bell has died

#51

Post by pmcjones »

ChrisArchitect wrote: post #21

From the Computer History Museum homepage: > REMEMBERING CHM COFOUNDER GORDON BELL > CHM is saddened to share the news that Museum cofounder and Fellow Gordon Bell passed away on May 17, 2024. Bell was a prominent American electrical engineer and computer scientist who made a tremendous impact on the world of computing—from handheld devices to supercomputers. Bell is in the pantheon of brilliant computer designers th…

Here's a tech report Gordon wrote:

Out of a Closet: The Early Years of Years of The Computer [X] Museums https://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=147...

And here's a website he created to capture the history of the original Computer Museum(s) at DEC and then Boston:

https://tcm.computerhistory.org

Re: Gordon Bell has died

#52

Post by avagate »

pfdietz wrote: post #25
jpgvm wrote: post #7

Gordon was the first investor in my first startup, the first guy that believed in us. Even though I only met him later in his life he was still sharp as a tack, never lost the mind of the engineer. Sometimes it's best not to meet your heroes but Gordon lived up to the hype and then some. Super gentle, generous with his time, the consummate gentleman. One of my fondest memories from my startup years was enjoying dinne…

I wonder if that cookie recipe is written down somewhere. Gordon Bell practiced "lifelogging", so maybe!

His lifelogging was a project called MyLifeBits. He wore a camera that took a picture every 20 seconds. Even called the book about his work Total Recall (and MSFT's new product that does something similar on the desktop is called Recall). Someone who worked with him at MSR wrote about it:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/gordon-bell-standing-shoulder...

Re: Gordon Bell has died

#53

Post by panick21_ »

I was just recently on a youtube trip listening to all his talks and interviews. Also read some stuff, But I need to get the 'Computer Engineering' book. And I love history, and he did so much both as a participant, analyst and historian. Defiantly want to learn even more.

Condolences to all who knew him.

Re: Gordon Bell has died

#54

Post by gojomo »

kragen wrote: post #42
workergnome wrote: post #10

My father worked with him at CMU and the story he always told (while possibly apocryphal) was that the reason that the ASCII bell character sequence was CRTL-G was because of Gordon.

it seems somewhat unlikely. let's follow the trail the existence of bell characters, of course, predates gordon bell's existence itself (they're in the ita2 baudot-murray code from 01932, two years before his birth) so what we're discussing is specifically the assignment of the ascii bell character to the control character corresponding to bell's middle initial it was already ^g in 01963 according to tom jennings's e…

I like that your deep dive into whether this story might be true is the polar opposite of the "too good to check" impulse in journalism & social media, which instead tries to squeeze some attention & entertainment out of a pleasing story before doing any checks that might ruin the illusion.

Re: Gordon Bell has died

#55

Post by benreesman »

"The cheapest, fastest, and most reliable components are those that are not there."

- Gordon Bell

Rest in Peace Legend.

I'm sure I join the entire community in wishing the best to his loved ones. He will be missed by all of us.

Re: Gordon Bell has died

#57

Post by ChuckMcM »

I was really sad to hear he had passed. Since the first computer I ever programmed was a PDP-8/e I thought the guy who designed it must be a genius. When the Computer History Museum was being formed I gave them "1K" ($1024) and the person who collected that at the reception I was attending was Gwen Bell. I told her I admired Gordon's work and she called him over to say "Hi". We talked for about an hour about the PDP 8 and how the /E differed from the first 8 and the 8/I. Later, at a Vintage Computer Festival event Gordon was being honored and I worked with my Dad to gold plate an XR2242 front panel key which we then attached to a medal ribbon and presented to Gordon in a flip up Medal Presentation box. He got a great kick out of that.

Definitely one of my heroes.

Re: Gordon Bell has died

#58

Post by mgarciaisaia »

kragen wrote: post #42
workergnome wrote: post #10

My father worked with him at CMU and the story he always told (while possibly apocryphal) was that the reason that the ASCII bell character sequence was CRTL-G was because of Gordon.

it seems somewhat unlikely. let's follow the trail the existence of bell characters, of course, predates gordon bell's existence itself (they're in the ita2 baudot-murray code from 01932, two years before his birth) so what we're discussing is specifically the assignment of the ascii bell character to the control character corresponding to bell's middle initial it was already ^g in 01963 according to tom jennings's e…

Don't you ever let reality get in the way of a good story

Re: Gordon Bell has died

#59

Post by chris_wot »

kragen wrote: post #42
workergnome wrote: post #10

My father worked with him at CMU and the story he always told (while possibly apocryphal) was that the reason that the ASCII bell character sequence was CRTL-G was because of Gordon.

it seems somewhat unlikely. let's follow the trail the existence of bell characters, of course, predates gordon bell's existence itself (they're in the ita2 baudot-murray code from 01932, two years before his birth) so what we're discussing is specifically the assignment of the ascii bell character to the control character corresponding to bell's middle initial it was already ^g in 01963 according to tom jennings's e…

Sir, that is an amazing answer and a real gem of info on HN - thank you!
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