Frances Elizabeth Allen (August 4, 1932August 4, 2020) was an American

computer scientist A computer scientist is a scientist who specializes in the academic study of computer science. Computer scientists typically work on the theoretical side of computation. Although computer scientists can also focus their work and research on ...

and pioneer in the field of

optimizing compiler An optimizing compiler is a compiler designed to generate code that is optimized in aspects such as minimizing program execution time, memory usage, storage size, and power consumption. Optimization is generally implemented as a sequence of op ...

s. Allen was the first woman to become an

IBM Fellow An IBM Fellow is a position at IBM appointed by the CEO. Typically only four to nine (eleven in 2014) IBM Fellows are appointed each year, in May or June. Fellow is the highest honor a scientist, engineer, or programmer at IBM can achieve. Over ...

, and in 2006 became the first woman to win the

Turing Award The ACM A. M. Turing Award is an annual prize given by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) for contributions of lasting and major technical importance to computer science. It is generally recognized as the highest distinction in the fi ...

. Her achievements include seminal work in

compiler In computing, a compiler is a computer program that Translator (computing), translates computer code written in one programming language (the ''source'' language) into another language (the ''target'' language). The name "compiler" is primaril ...

program optimization In computer science, program optimization, code optimization, or software optimization is the process of modifying a software system to make some aspect of it work more efficiently or use fewer resources. In general, a computer program may be op ...

, and

parallelization Parallel computing is a type of computation in which many calculations or processes are carried out simultaneously. Large problems can often be divided into smaller ones, which can then be solved at the same time. There are several different for ...

. She worked for IBM from 1957 to 2002 and subsequently was a Fellow Emerita.

Early life and education

Allen grew up on a farm in

Peru Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

, near

Lake Champlain Lake Champlain ( ; , ) is a natural freshwater lake in North America. It mostly lies between the U.S. states of New York (state), New York and Vermont, but also extends north into the Canadian province of Quebec. The cities of Burlington, Ve ...

, as the oldest of six children. Her father was a farmer, and her mother an elementary schoolteacher. Her early elementary education took place in a one-room school house a mile away from her home, and she later attended a local high school. She graduated from The New York State College for Teachers (now part of the

University at Albany, SUNY The State University of New York at Albany (University at Albany, UAlbany, or SUNY Albany) is a Public university, public research university in Albany, New York, United States. Founded in 1844, it is one of four "university centers" of the St ...

) with a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

degree in

mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

in 1954 and began teaching school in Peru, New York. After two years, she enrolled at the

University of Michigan The University of Michigan (U-M, U of M, or Michigan) is a public university, public research university in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest institution of higher education in the state. The University of Mi ...

and earned a

Master of Science A Master of Science (; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree. In contrast to the Master of Arts degree, the Master of Science degree is typically granted for studies in sciences, engineering and medici ...

degree in mathematics in 1957.

Career and research

Deeply in debt with

student loan A student loan is a type of loan designed to help students pay for post-secondary education and the associated fees, such as tuition, books and supplies, and living expenses. It may differ from other types of loans in the fact that the interest ...

s, she joined

IBM Research IBM Research is the research and development division for IBM, an American Multinational corporation, multinational information technology company. IBM Research is headquartered at the Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York ...

Poughkeepsie Poughkeepsie ( ) is a city within the Town of Poughkeepsie, New York. It is the county seat of Dutchess County, with a 2020 census population of 31,577. Poughkeepsie is in the Hudson River Valley region, midway between the core of the New ...

, New York, as a programmer in 1957, where she taught incoming employees the basics of Fortran. She planned to return to teaching once her student loans had been paid, but ended up staying with IBM for her entire 45-year career. In 1959, Allen was assigned to the

Harvest Harvesting is the process of collecting plants, animals, or fish (as well as fungi) as food, especially the process of gathering mature crops, and "the harvest" also refers to the collected crops. Reaping is the cutting of grain or pulses fo ...

project for code breaking with the

National Security Agency The National Security Agency (NSA) is an intelligence agency of the United States Department of Defense, under the authority of the director of national intelligence (DNI). The NSA is responsible for global monitoring, collection, and proces ...

, and worked on a

programming language A programming language is a system of notation for writing computer programs. Programming languages are described in terms of their Syntax (programming languages), syntax (form) and semantics (computer science), semantics (meaning), usually def ...

called ''Alpha''. She managed the compiler-optimization team for both Harvest and the Stretch project. In 1962, she was transferred to

Thomas J. Watson Research Center The Thomas J. Watson Research Center is the headquarters for IBM Research. Its main laboratory is in Yorktown Heights, New York, 38 miles (61 km) north of New York City. It also operates facilities in Cambridge, Massachusetts and Albany, ...

, where she contributed to the

ACS-1 The ACS-1 and ACS-360 are two related supercomputers designed by IBM as part of the Advanced Computing Systems project from 1965 to 1969. Although the designs were never finished and no models ever went into production, the project spawned a numbe ...

project, and later in the 1970s, to

PL/I PL/I (Programming Language One, pronounced and sometimes written PL/1) is a procedural, imperative computer programming language initially developed by IBM. It is designed for scientific, engineering, business and system programming. It has b ...

. During these years, she worked with fellow researcher John Cocke to write a series of seminal papers on

s, helping to improve the efficiency of machine code translated from high-level languages. From 1970 to 1971 she spent a

sabbatical A sabbatical (from the Hebrew: (i.e., Sabbath); in Latin ; Greek: ) is a rest or break from work; "an extended period of time intentionally spent on something that’s not your routine job." The concept of the sabbatical is based on the Bi ...

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private university, private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded in 1832 by Albert Gallatin as a Nondenominational ...

and acted as

adjunct professor An adjunct professor is a type of academic appointment in higher education who does not work at the establishment full-time. The terms of this appointment and the job security of the tenure vary in different parts of the world, but the term is gen ...

for a few years afterward. Another sabbatical brought her to

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

in 1977. From 1980 to 1995, Allen led IBM's work in the developing

parallel computing Parallel computing is a type of computing, computation in which many calculations or Process (computing), processes are carried out simultaneously. Large problems can often be divided into smaller ones, which can then be solved at the same time. ...

area, and helped to develop software for the IBM

Blue Gene Blue Gene was an IBM project aimed at designing supercomputers that can reach operating speeds in the petaFLOPS (PFLOPS) range, with relatively low power consumption. The project created three generations of supercomputers, Blue Gene/L, Blue ...

project. Allen became the first female

in 1989. She retired from IBM in 2002, but remained affiliated with the corporation as a Fellow Emerita. In 2007, the IBM Ph.D. Fellowship Award was created in her honor. After retiring, she remained active in programs that encourage women and girls to seek careers in science and computing. Her A. M. Turing Award citation reads:

Awards and honors

Allen was a Fellow of the

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is an American 501(c)(3) public charity professional organization for electrical engineering, electronics engineering, and other related disciplines. The IEEE has a corporate office ...

(IEEE) and the

Association for Computing Machinery The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) is a US-based international learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 and is the world's largest scientific and educational computing society. The ACM is a non-profit professional membe ...

(ACM). In 2000, she was made a Fellow of the

Computer History Museum The Computer History Museum (CHM) is a computer museum in Mountain View, California. The museum presents stories and artifacts of Silicon Valley and the Information Age, and explores the Digital Revolution, computing revolution and its impact ...

"for her contributions to program optimization and compiling for

parallel computer Parallel computing is a type of computation in which many calculations or processes are carried out simultaneously. Large problems can often be divided into smaller ones, which can then be solved at the same time. There are several different for ...

s". She was elected to the

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American Nonprofit organization, nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. It is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), along with the National Academ ...

in 1987, to the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS) is an American scholarly organization and learned society founded in 1743 in Philadelphia that promotes knowledge in the humanities and natural sciences through research, professional meetings, publicat ...

in 2001, and to the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...

in 2010. She was nominated a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1994. She received the IEEE Computer Society Charles Babbage Award in 1997 and the Computer Pioneer Award of the IEEE Computer Society in 2004. In 1997, Allen was inducted into the Witi Hall of Fame. She won the 2002 Augusta Ada Lovelace Award from the Association for

Women in Computing Women in computing were among the first programmers in the early 20th century, and contributed substantially to the industry. As technology and practices altered, the role of women as programmers has changed, and the recorded history of the fi ...

. In 2004, Allen was the winner of the ABIE Award for Technical Leadership from the Anita Borg Institute. Allen was recognized for her work in

high-performance computing High-performance computing (HPC) is the use of supercomputers and computer clusters to solve advanced computation problems. Overview HPC integrates systems administration (including network and security knowledge) and parallel programming into ...

with the 2006

. She became the first woman recipient in the forty-year history of the award, which is considered the equivalent of the

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; ; ) are awards administered by the Nobel Foundation and granted in accordance with the principle of "for the greatest benefit to humankind". The prizes were first awarded in 1901, marking the fifth anniversary of Alfred N ...

for computing and is given by the

. In interviews following the award she hoped it would give more "opportunities for women in science, computing, and engineering". In 2009 she was awarded an honorary doctor of science degree from

McGill University McGill University (French: Université McGill) is an English-language public research university in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1821 by royal charter,Frost, Stanley Brice. ''McGill University, Vol. I. For the Advancement of Learning, ...

for "pioneering contributions to the theory and practice of optimizing compiler techniques that laid the foundation for modern optimizing compilers and automatic parallel execution".

Publications

A list of her select publications includes: * * Allen, Frances E., "Interprocedural data flow analysis", ''Proceedings of Information Processing 74'', IFIP, Elsevier / North-Holland (1974), 398–402. * Allen, Frances E. and J. Cocke, "A program data flow analysis procedure", ''Communications of the ACM'', Vol. 19, No. 3 (March 1976), 137–147. * Allen, Frances E. et al., "The Experimental Compiling System", ''IBM Journal of Research and Development'', Vol. 24, No. 6, (November 1980), 695–715. * Allen, Frances E., "The history of language processor technology at IBM", ''IBM Journal of Research and Development'', Vol. 25, No. 5 (September 1981), 535–548.

Personal life

In 1972, Allen married

computer science professor and collaborator

Jacob T. Schwartz __NOTOC__ Jacob Theodore "Jack" Schwartz (January 9, 1930 – March 2, 2009) was an American mathematician, computer scientist, and professor of computer science at the New York University Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. He was the ...

. They divorced in 1982. Allen died on August 4, 2020, her 88th birthday, from complications with

Alzheimer's disease Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease and the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in remembering recent events. As the disease advances, symptoms can include problems wit ...

References

External links

Frances Allen: 2000 Fellow Awards Recipient
via Computer History Museum
Fran Allen on Compilers and Parallel Computing Systems
Notes from her 2008 Organick Memorial Lecture {{DEFAULTSORT:Allen, Frances 1932 births 2020 deaths American computer scientists Programming language researchers American women computer scientists Turing Award laureates Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 1994 fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery Fellows of the IEEE IBM Fellows Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering IBM Research computer scientists New York University faculty People from Peru, New York University at Albany, SUNY alumni University of Michigan College of Literature, Science, and the Arts alumni 20th-century American scientists 21st-century American scientists 20th-century American women scientists 21st-century American women scientists Scientists from New York (state)