[vcf-midatlantic] Fwd: ENIACtion ['] IEEE Milestone Event for Grace Hopper's A-O Compiler at UPenn May 7th

[Jeffrey Brace]

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On Tuesday Morning, May 7th, an IEEE Milestone Plaque will be unveiled at
the Engineering School of the University of Pennsylvania in honor of Grace
Hopper's development of the A-O Compiler and Automatic Programming. The
building where the plaque will be placed is where Rear Admiral Hopper had
worked on this effort.

Details about how to register to attend in-person or view the ceremony
online are at:
<https://events.seas.upenn.edu/event/ieee-grace-hopper-milestone-celebration/>
<https://events.seas.upenn.edu/event/ieee-grace-hopper-milestone-celebration/>
.

*IEEE Milestone Plaque Citation*
A-O Compiler and Initial Development of Automatic Programming, 1951-1952
During 1951-1952, Grace Hopper invented the A-O Compiler, a series of
specifications that functioned as a linker/loader. It was a pioneering
achievement of automatic programming as well as a pioneering utility
program for the management of subroutines. That A-O Compiler influenced the
development of arithmetic and business programming languages. This led to
COBOL (Common Business-Oriented Language) becoming the dominant high-level
language for business applications.


*About Grace Hopper *Rear Admiral Grace Hopper was a mathematician,
computer scientist, systems designer and the inventor of the compiler. Her
outstanding contributions to computer science benefited academia, industry
and the military. In 1928 she graduated from Vassar College with a B.A. in
mathematics and physics and joined the Vassar faculty. While an instructor,
she continued her studies in mathematics at Yale University where she
earned an MA in 1930 and a Ph.D. in 1934.

Grace Hopper is known worldwide for her work with the first large-scale
digital computer, the Navy’s Mark I. In 1949 she joined Philadelphia’s
Eckert-Mauchly, founded by the builders of ENIAC, which was building UNIVAC
I. Her work on compilers and on making machines understand ordinary
language instructions lead ultimately to the development of the business
language, COBOL. Grace Hopper served on the faculty of the Moore School for
15 years, and in 1974 received an honorary degree from the University.

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