Gerrit Anne "Gerry" Blaauw (July 17, 1924 – March 21, 2018) was a Dutch computer scientist, known as one of the principal designers of the
IBM System/360
The IBM System/360 (S/360) is a family of mainframe computer systems that was announced by IBM on April 7, 1964, and delivered between 1965 and 1978. It was the first family of computers designed to cover both commercial and scientific applica ...
line of computers, together with
Fred Brooks
Frederick Phillips Brooks Jr. (April 19, 1931 – November 17, 2022) was an American computer architect, software engineer, and computer scientist, best known for managing the development of IBM's System/360 family of computers and the O ...
,
Gene Amdahl
Gene Myron Amdahl (November 16, 1922 – November 10, 2015) was an American computer architect and high-tech entrepreneur, chiefly known for his work on mainframe computers at IBM and later his own companies, especially Amdahl Corporation ...
, and others.
["Gerrit Blaauw"]
in ''Unsung Heroes in Dutch Computing History'', a website created for the IEEE Computer Society's Web Programming Competition (CHC61), 2007
Biography
Born in The Hague, Netherlands, Blaauw received his BA from the
Delft University of Technology
Delft University of Technology ( nl, Technische Universiteit Delft), also known as TU Delft, is the oldest and largest Dutch public technical university, located in Delft, Netherlands. As of 2022 it is ranked by QS World University Rankings among ...
in 1946. In 1947, Blaauw won an exclusive scholarship funded by IBM Chief Executive Officer
Thomas J. Watson
Thomas John Watson Sr. (February 17, 1874 – June 19, 1956) was an American businessman who served as the chairman and CEO of IBM. He oversaw the company's growth into an international force from 1914 to 1956. Watson developed IBM's manageme ...
. After an initial year at
Lafayette College
Lafayette College is a private liberal arts college in Easton, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1826 by James Madison Porter and other citizens in Easton, the college first held classes in 1832. The founders voted to name the college after General Laf ...
in
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
, Blaauw studied at
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
. He received his MA in 1949 and his PhD in 1952 under supervision of
Howard Aiken
Howard Hathaway Aiken (March 8, 1900 – March 14, 1973) was an American physicist and a pioneer in computing, being the original conceptual designer behind IBM's Harvard Mark I computer.
Biography
Aiken studied at the University of Wisconsi ...
, inventor of the early Mark I computer. At Harvard, he worked on design of the
Mark III and
Mark IV computers. Blaauw met
Fred Brooks
Frederick Phillips Brooks Jr. (April 19, 1931 – November 17, 2022) was an American computer architect, software engineer, and computer scientist, best known for managing the development of IBM's System/360 family of computers and the O ...
while he was working for IBM and visited Harvard, where Fred Brooks was then a graduate student.
[
After graduation in 1952, Blaauw returned to the Netherlands where he worked at the ]Mathematical Centre
The (abbr. CWI; English: "National Research Institute for Mathematics and Computer Science") is a research centre in the field of mathematics and theoretical computer science. It is part of the institutes organization of the Dutch Research Cou ...
on the second ARRA computer. In 1955 he returned to the United States to work at IBM's Poughkeepsie
Poughkeepsie ( ), officially the City of Poughkeepsie, separate from the Town of Poughkeepsie around it) is a city in the U.S. state of New York. It is the county seat of Dutchess County, with a 2020 census population of 31,577. Poughkeepsi ...
labs where he worked with Brooks on a number of projects:
* He was a designer on the IBM 7030 STRETCH
The IBM 7030, also known as Stretch, was IBM's first transistorized supercomputer. It was the fastest computer in the world from 1961 until the first CDC 6600 became operational in 1964."Designed by Seymour Cray, the CDC 6600 was almost three t ...
project.
* He worked on the ill-fated IBM 8000
The IBM 8000 series was a proposed transistor-based successor to the IBM 7000 series. Important engineers on the project included Fred Brooks and Gerry Blaauw. The project plan for the 8000 series was presented by Fred Brooks in January 1961. D ...
series, and in particular designed a paging system for the IBM 8106 in the 1960-1961 period.
* He was a key engineer on the IBM System/360
The IBM System/360 (S/360) is a family of mainframe computer systems that was announced by IBM on April 7, 1964, and delivered between 1965 and 1978. It was the first family of computers designed to cover both commercial and scientific applica ...
project, announced in 1964. Among other contributions, Blaauw made the successful case for an 8-bit
In computer architecture, 8-bit Integer (computer science), integers or other Data (computing), data units are those that are 8 bits wide (1 octet (computing), octet). Also, 8-bit central processing unit (CPU) and arithmetic logic unit (ALU) arc ...
(as opposed to 6-bit) computer architecture
In computer engineering, computer architecture is a description of the structure of a computer system made from component parts. It can sometimes be a high-level description that ignores details of the implementation. At a more detailed level, t ...
.
Blaauw also designed a revolutionary address translation system, the "Blaauw Box", which was removed from the original System/360
The IBM System/360 (S/360) is a family of mainframe computer systems that was announced by IBM on April 7, 1964, and delivered between 1965 and 1978. It was the first family of computers designed to cover both commercial and scientific applica ...
design, but was later used in IBM's unsuccessful proposal to MIT's Project MAC
Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) is a research institute at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) formed by the 2003 merger of the Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) and the Artificial Intelligence Lab ...
. Subsequently, Dynamic Address Translation (DAT) hardware of a somewhat different design was incorporated in the important IBM System/360-67
The IBM System/360 Model 67 (S/360-67) was an important IBM mainframe model in the late 1960s.
* It had "its own powerful operating system... heTime Sharing System monitor (TSS)" offering "virtually instantaneous access to and response from t ...
computer.["Program and Addressing Structure in a Time-Sharing Environment"]
B. W. Arden , B. A. Galler , T. C. O'Brien , F. H. Westervelt, ''Journal of the ACM'', v.13 n.1, p.1-16, Jan. 1966 As implemented on the Model 67, DAT hardware allowed the implementation of some of the first practical paged virtual memory
In computing, virtual memory, or virtual storage is a memory management technique that provides an "idealized abstraction of the storage resources that are actually available on a given machine" which "creates the illusion to users of a very l ...
systems – perhaps the first to be commercially successful. The Model 67 was being used in commercial applications by 1968. The earlier Ferranti Atlas Computer
The Atlas Computer was one of the world's first supercomputers, in use from 1962 (when it was claimed to be the most powerful computer in the world) to 1972. Atlas' capacity promoted the saying that when it went offline, half of the United Ki ...
was a seminal platform for paging research, but suffered from well-studied performance issues such as thrashing. Virtual memory address translation capabilities similar to those on the S/360-67 were subsequently included in all models of the IBM System/370
The IBM System/370 (S/370) is a model range of IBM mainframe computers announced on June 30, 1970, as the successors to the System/360 family. The series mostly maintains backward compatibility with the S/360, allowing an easy migration path f ...
computer line that followed.
After leaving IBM, Blaauw became a computer science professor in the Netherlands. He retired in 1989 as professor emeritus with Universiteit Twente
The University of Twente (Dutch: ''Universiteit Twente''; , abbr. ) is a public technical university located in Enschede, Netherlands.
The university has been placed in the top 170 universities in the world by multiple central ranking tables. In ...
.[ In 1982 he was elected member of the ]Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences ( nl, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, abbreviated: KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed ...
. In 1997 he co-authored ''Computer Architecture: Concepts and Evolution'' with Brooks.''Computer Architecture: Concepts and Evolution''
Gerrit A. Blaauw and Frederick P. Brooks, Addison-Wesley Professional, 1264 pp., February 1997,
Blaauw died in Utrecht.
Blaauw was a devout Christian who gave particular attention, especially after retirement, to the relationship of science and faith, a topic he explored in a booklet available in English, Dutch and Spanish.
Selected publications
* Blaauw, Gerrit A. ''Digital system implementation.'' Prentice Hall PTR, 1976.
* Blaauw, Gerrit A., and Frederick P. Brooks Jr. ''Computer architecture: concepts and evolution.'' Addison-Wesley Longman Publishing Co., Inc., 1997.
* Blaauw, Gerrit A. ''Scripture and Science: An Unexpected Harmony.'' 2014
Published online
Selected articles
* Brooks, Frederick P., Gerrit A. Blaauw, and Wilfried Buchholz. "Processing data in bits and pieces." ''IRE Transactions on Electronic Computers'' 2 (1959): 118-124.
*
* Blaauw, Gerrit A., and Frederick P. Brooks Jr. "The structure of SYSTEM/360: Part I—Outline of the logical structure." IBM Systems Journal 3.2 (1964): 119-135.
Patents
* Amdahl, Gene M., et al. "Data processing system." U.S. Patent No. 3,400,371. 3 Sep. 1968.
References
Further reading
* xtensive (819 ''pp.'') treatment of IBM's offerings during this period. Blaauw is mentioned on numerous pages.
External links
Gerrit Blaauw
, unsung heroes in Dutch computing history.
DIESREDE BLAAUW: BESCHRIJVEN EN BEGRIJPEN
26 November 1976 (in Dutch)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Blaauw, Gerrit
Dutch computer scientists
20th-century Dutch inventors
1924 births
2018 deaths
IBM employees
Harvard University alumni
Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
University of Twente faculty
Scientists from The Hague
20th-century Dutch scientists
VM (operating system)