Thomas Robert Gruber (born 1959) is 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 ...

inventor An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea, or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an ...

, and

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value in ways that generally entail beyond the minimal amount of risk (assumed by a traditional business), and potentially involving values besides simply economic ones. An entreprene ...

with a focus on systems for knowledge sharing and collective intelligence. He did foundational work in

ontology engineering In computer science, information science and systems engineering, ontology engineering is a field which studies the methods and methodologies for building Ontology (information science), ontologies, which encompasses a representation, formal nami ...

and is well known for his definition of ontologies in the context of

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is the capability of computer, computational systems to perform tasks typically associated with human intelligence, such as learning, reasoning, problem-solving, perception, and decision-making. It is a field of re ...

.Tom Gruber Keynote
at ISWC2006. Retrieved 6 Oktober 2008.Zhifeng Yang (2002). "Applying Information Retrieval Technology to Incremental Knowledge Management". In: ''Engineering and Deployment of Cooperative Information Systems: First International Conference, EDCIS 2002, Beijing, China, September 17–20, 2002 : Proceedings''. Yanbo Han (ed.), pp. 117–120 In 2007 Gruber co-founded Siri Inc., which created the

Siri Siri ( , backronym: Speech Interpretation and Recognition Interface) is a digital assistant purchased, developed, and popularized by Apple Inc., which is included in the iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, macOS, Apple TV, audioOS, and visionOS operating sys ...

intelligent personal assistant A virtual assistant (VA) is a software agent that can perform a range of tasks or services for a user based on user input such as commands or questions, including verbal ones. Such technologies often incorporate chatbot capabilities to strea ...

and knowledge navigator. Siri Inc. was acquired by

Apple An apple is a round, edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus'' spp.). Fruit trees of the orchard or domestic apple (''Malus domestica''), the most widely grown in the genus, are agriculture, cultivated worldwide. The tree originated ...

in 2010, and Siri is now an integral part of

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

Biography

Gruber studied

psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...

and

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...

at the

Loyola University New Orleans Loyola University New Orleans is a Private university, private Jesuit university in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. Originally established as Loyola College in 1904, the institution was chartered as a university in 1912. It bears the nam ...

, where he received a double major B.S. in 1981 and graduated summa cum laude. He designed and implemented a computer-assisted instruction (CAI) system for programmed-curriculum courses. It was the first of its kind at the university and is used routinely by the Psychology department for introductory courses. In 1984 he received a M.S. in Computer and Information Science at the

University of Massachusetts Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst) is a public land-grant research university in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States. It is the flagship campus of the University of Massachusetts system and was founded in 1863 as the ...

. For his Master's research, Gruber designed and implemented an intelligent communication

prosthesis In medicine, a prosthesis (: prostheses; from ), or a prosthetic implant, is an artificial device that replaces a missing body part, which may be lost through physical trauma, disease, or a condition present at birth (Congenital, congenital disord ...

assistant, a computer system which enables people with severe physical disabilities who cannot otherwise speak to communicate in

natural language A natural language or ordinary language is a language that occurs naturally in a human community by a process of use, repetition, and change. It can take different forms, typically either a spoken language or a sign language. Natural languages ...

presented in displayed, written, or spoken form. Four years later in 1988 at the

he received a Ph.D. in Computer and Information Science with the dissertation "The Acquisition of Strategic Knowledge". His dissertation research addressed a critical problem for Artificial Intelligence—knowledge acquisition—with a computer assistant that acquires strategic knowledge from experts.Thomas Robert Gruber
. Home page at Stanford. Last updated 1995. Retrieved 6 October 2008. From 1988 to 1994 Gruber was a research associate at the Knowledge Systems Laboratory of the Computer Science Department at

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 ...

. He worked on the How Things Work, SHADE, and Knowledge Sharing Technology projects. In 1994 he became Senior Project Leader,

Enterprise Integration Enterprise integration is a technical field of enterprise architecture, which is focused on the study of topics such as system interconnection, electronic data interchange, product data exchange and distributed computing environments. It is a con ...

Technologies and proposed and designed several projects using the Internet to create shared, virtual environments for collaborative learning and work (for ARPA, NASA, and NIST). During this time, he also proposed a business plan for corporate training. In 1995, he founded and became Chief Technology Officer of Intraspect Software, an enterprise software company that did early commercial work on collaborative knowledge management. Intraspect applications help professional people collaborate in large distributed communities, continuously contributing to a collective body of knowledge. Gruber has been a member of journal editorial boards of the "Knowledge Acquisition", "IEEE Expert" and "International Journal of Human-Computer Studies".

Work

Gruber's research interests in the 1990s were in the field of developing intelligent networked software to support human collaboration and learning. Areas of specialty include knowledge acquisition, knowledge representation, computer-supported collaborative work,

computer-mediated communication Computer-mediated communication (CMC) is defined as any human communication that occurs through the use of two or more electronic devices. While the term has traditionally referred to those communications that occur via computer-mediated forma ...

for design, and knowledge sharing technology. In 1994 he was responsible for the creation of

hypermail Hypermail is a free program for creating email archives, in the form of cross-referenced HTML documents. It takes a file in Unix mbox format and generates an HTML archive, complete with an index and various sorting options. It is commonly used for ...

, an email to web gateway software that saw extensive use after a rewrite by a different programmer. In 2007 Gruber co-founded Siri Inc., which created the

and knowledge navigator. Siri Inc. was acquired by

in 2010, and Siri is now an integral part of

. In 2016, Siri was added to

macOS macOS, previously OS X and originally Mac OS X, is a Unix, Unix-based operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 2001. It is the current operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. With ...

macOS Sierra macOS Sierra (version 10.12) is the thirteenth major release of macOS (formerly known as and ), Apple Inc.'s desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. The name "macOS" stems from the intention to unify the operating syst ...

. In April 2017 Gruber spoke on the TED stage about his vision for the future of "humanistic AI" especially in regard to augmentation of human capacities such as memory. He is quoted saying, "We are in the middle of a renaissance in AI. Every time a machine gets smarter, we get smarter."

Publications

Gruber published several articles and some books,DBLP: Thomas R. Gruber
most notably: * * 1993
"Toward Principles for the Design of Ontologies Used for Knowledge Sharing"
In: ''International Journal Human-Computer Studies''. Vol 43, p. 907-928. * 1993

In: ''Knowledge Acquisition'', 5(2):199-220, 1993 * 2008

Entry in the Encyclopedia of Database Systems, Ling Liu and M. Tamer Özsu (Eds.), Springer-Verlag, to appear in 2008.

References

External links

Tom Gruber
Recent homepage.
Tom Gruber
Homepage in 1994 at Stanford {{DEFAULTSORT:Gruber, Tom 1959 births American computer scientists Living people American software engineers American technology company founders American company founders Semantic Web people

Biography

Work

Publications

See also

References

External links