George Ledin, Jr. (born January 28, 1946) is an American computer scientist and professor of computer science at

Sonoma State University Sonoma State University (SSU, Sonoma State, or Sonoma) is a public university in Rohnert Park in Sonoma County, California, US. It is one of the smallest members of the California State University (CSU) system. Sonoma State offers 92 Bachelor's d ...

. Ledin's teaching of

computer security Computer security, cybersecurity (cyber security), or information technology security (IT security) is the protection of computer systems and networks from attack by malicious actors that may result in unauthorized information disclosure, the ...

at Sonoma State has been controversial for its inclusion of material on how to write

malware Malware (a portmanteau for ''malicious software'') is any software intentionally designed to cause disruption to a computer, server, client, or computer network, leak private information, gain unauthorized access to information or systems, depri ...

. Ledin is a strong critic of the antivirus software industry, whose products he considers almost useless. Ledin also helped found the computer science program at the

University of San Francisco The University of San Francisco (USF) is a private Jesuit university in San Francisco, California. The university's main campus is located on a setting between the Golden Gate Bridge and Golden Gate Park. The main campus is nicknamed "The Hil ...

, and published several books on computing in the 1970s and 1980s.

Education and career

Ledin is a 1967 graduate of the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

. He started teaching computer science at the

in 1965, as the second computer scientist at the university, five years before the university's computer science department itself was founded. In 1970, he served as vice-president of

The Fibonacci Association The Fibonacci Association is a mathematical organization that specializes in the Fibonacci number sequence and a wide variety of related subjects, generalizations, and applications, including recurrence relations, combinatorial identities, binomia ...

, and host of its annual meeting. In 1973, as a researcher in the Institute of Chemical Biology and instructor in computer science at the university, he was the chair of the first national conference on ALGOL, By 1980 he was head of the computer science department at the university. He earned a

Juris Doctor The Juris Doctor (J.D. or JD), also known as Doctor of Jurisprudence (J.D., JD, D.Jur., or DJur), is a graduate-entry professional degree in law and one of several Doctor of Law degrees. The J.D. is the standard degree obtained to practice law ...

at the University of San Francisco in 1982, and moved to the Sonoma State faculty in 1984.

Books

Ledin is author or co-author of books including: *''Programming the IBM 1130'' (with Robert K. Louden, 2nd ed., Prentice-Hall, 1972) *''A Structured Approach to General BASIC'' (Boyd & Fraser, 1978) *''The Programmer's Book of Rules'' (Lifetime Learning / Wiley, 1979) *''Understanding Pascal'' (Alfred Publishing, 1981) *''Pascal'' (Mayfield Publishing, 1982) *''The Personal Computer Glossary'' (Alfred Publishing, 1983) *''The COBOL Programmer's Book of Rules'' (with Victor Ledin and Michael D. Kudlick, Lifetime Learning / Wiley, 1983).

Personal life

Ledin was born in Austria. He and his co-author Victor Ledin are brothers, both sons of Georgii Grigorievich Ledin (1921–2019), an immigrant from the Georgian city of Sukhumi.

References

External links

Dr. Ledin page
@ Sonoma State University.
"Not teaching malware is harmful"
@ Sonoma State University. {{DEFAULTSORT:Ledin, George Living people American computer scientists University of California, Berkeley alumni University of San Francisco alumni Sonoma State University faculty Computer security specialists 20th-century American scientists 21st-century American scientists 1946 births