Talk:Donald Knuth/Archive 1

Archive 1

TAOCP Volume 4

VOlume 4 Part 1 is about to come out in a few months (January 2011, available for preorder on Amazon). Once that's out, the fascicles of Volume 4 to date should probably be left off the publication list, since they would be superseded by the assembled volume. That assumes all of the material from those fascicles actually did go into that volume, of course. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.253.59.34 (talk) 05:46, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

Personal Info

Any info on his life in here? Is he married, etc —Preceding unsigned comment added by 38.115.166.174 (talk) 18:44, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Jill. 143.232.210.38 (talk) 21:26, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

He is married and has two children: Jennifer, John. See webofstories.com for more info. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vissitmb (talk • contribs) 22:03, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Rumor That He's dead

Somebody added a note to the top of the page (before the interlanguage links, even) claiming that Donald Knuth was dead. Aside from the poor formatting, it was very un-NPOV, so much so I figured it was better reverted and double-checked. The page linked to here doesn't say anything about it, but since it's his personal page, I wouldn't really expect it to be promptly updated if he had died. :-\ Do we have any Stanford people who can check his status? -- John Owens 12:01 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Knock knock. "Professor Knuth, are you alright in there" :) No I think we can safely assume Stanford's daily events page would have listed it. The death of this great man would probably be considered more important than a few art exhibitions and Stanford Garden Tours. -- Tim Starling 12:17 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)

The page you're refering to doesn't go back till 2001. I just stumbled over a page that claims that he died on February 10 2001: http://www.wchs.srsd.sk.ca/Barteski/Computers%209/Brettttt%20Duponttttt.htm

Another page talks about him in past tense: http://www.larry.denenberg.com/Knuth-3-16/

This last is a spoof (and says so, if you read it). -- The Anome 22:38, 5 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I can't find anything else on the internet that supports or disproves that he died. I hope this is not true!

Knuth is still alive as of August 2003 -- hooray! See the fine print in http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/news.html -- The Anome 22:42, 5 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Seeing as he's my math instructor's father, and my instructor has said nothing... i'd say so. :)

I am an MSCS at Stanford. I'm happy to say Don is very much alive and in good health. I sat in on a lecture he gave today (10/3/2008) on his current research. Risujin (talk) 01:54, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Of all things

an edit history summary said:

(mention hobbies, wife (who wrote a book on liturgy of all things - wonder if was marked up in TeX??))

"of all things"? You obviously haven't really looked at the list of Knuth's own publications... —Paul A 01:42, 25 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Grammar

The paragraph that starts with "He pioneered the concept of literate programming" has poor grammar. Maybe someone who knows more about lists and semicolons can rework it. cbm 02:51, 2004 Feb 1 (UTC)

Pronunciation

Can someone add a phonetic spelling of Knuth? Parts of Michigan believe the K is silent. (have mercy on my first wiki post)thanks

From Knuth's webpage( http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/faq.html ), it is pronounced Ka-NOOTH. Someone should add that to the article ... Not sure how phonetics work in Wikipedia. -- Neoncow 19:08, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Ka-NOOTH may be how he gives his name's pronunciation on his website but what's needed here, to make it comprehensible, is an IPA transcription. IPA is how phonetics work in Wikipedia. Jimp 28Nov05

Of course "Ka-NOOTH" would probably be transcribed as /kəˈnuːθ/. The Storm Surfer 00:54, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

And of course what's meant by ka-NOOTH is rather KNOOTH, or /ˈknuːθ/. —Nightstallion (?) 00:26, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Then which is correct, /kəˈnuːθ/ or /ˈknuːθ/? Is a pronounced? -- Envia 13:20, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Not if you can help it, but it's OK to pronounce it. --Kjoonlee 21:01, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

hoax?

Looks like this addition that he died is a hoax. No one is reporting it, nothing on slashdot, nothing on news.google.com. --rydel 01:59, 26 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I bashed all the bogus redirs, they will never catch typos or have any other use. Stan 03:42, 26 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I have received an email today from the head of the computer science department at Stanford, saying he had not heard of Knuth's death, and would have heard if it had happened. Michael Hardy 00:07, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I have seen Donald Knuth today, and even took a photograph. For a dead person, he discusses mathematics surprisingly well. David.Monniaux 21:30, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Please -- we settled this question last November. Knuth lives. Michael Hardy 23:12, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If we cannot even joke on talk pages... David.Monniaux 07:37, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yes, but unless he's immortal (we should be so lucky), it's a question that must be settled every day. Max Hyre 13:27, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Chinese name

Chinese name of Knuth was added on Feb 16, 2005 by Yaohua2000. I could not find any relation to China, only comment on his webpage: [1].

The webpage suggests it is a joke. It should be removed from first paragraph. Pavel Vozenilek 16:22, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

See this webpage [2], the first line says: Donald E. Knuth (高德纳), Professor Emeritus of... --Yaohua2000 03:09, 2005 Mar 16 (UTC)

Yes but is it anything else than a joke? Some people put an icon next to their names, Knuth has something original. Pavel Vozenilek 17:57, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It is not icon, it is yin4zhang1, Chinese usually make their name as a yin4zhang1, it is not a joke, yin4zhang1 usually is widely used in many official situation such as government's documents or drawings by famous artists, it is also widely used in the end of handwriting mails, so the writer doesn't have to write his/her name by hand. My English is not good you know, you can google Chinese seal for detailed information about yin4zhang1. zh.wikipedia.org also has an article about yin4zhang1 [3]. -- Yaohua2000 13:15, 2005 Mar 19 (UTC)

I am giving it up - I do not have enough of context. I only suggest not to use the word "name" here. As it is written now it suggests the Chinese name is real one and English variant is used as convenience transcription. Pavel Vozenilek 13:51, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Well, since he refers to it in his page's FAQ [4] as "[his] Chinese name, given to [him] in 1977 by Frances Yao", it's probably safe to assume it's legit, hmm? Or at least, as much so as we can get. - Dallan Invictus (no account yet), 02:33, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

I know but it sounds to me as one of his jokes. But I really do not know enough of context here. Pavel Vozenilek 19:26, 16 May 2005 (UTC)

Here is Preface to the Chinese Edition of TAOCP: Greetings to all readers of these books in China! I fondly hope that many Chinese computer programmers will learn to recognize my Chinese name Gao Dena, which was given to me by Francis Yao just before I visited your country in 1977. I still have very fond memories of that three-week visit, and I have been glad to see Gao Dena on the masthead of the Journal of Computer Science and Technology since 1989. This name makes me feel close to all Chinese people although I cannot speak your language. - Yaohua2000 08:56, 2005 May 17 (UTC)

A joke? How do you define a joke??!! If he didn't take that name seriously he wouldn't have his seals made ([5], [6]). I'm not seeing any joke here, so I put his Chinese name back in the first paragraph. --GnuDoyng (talk) 14:10, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

• Wikipedia is NOR, and until it is clear what established knowledge this nugget embodies, it does not belong at all. Once it is, it almost certainly still does not belong in the lead sent, nor anywhere in the lead section.
  --Jerzy•t 03:37, 8 July 2008 (UTC)
  

Copyright question about the famous check

Since Don Knuth's famous reward checks are so well known, I thought it could be nice to have one attached to the article. Some images are linked from the page Knuth reward check, for example [7]; I can provide a scan of a check, remove the number and name and upload it, but I was wondering what the copyright status may be, since I imagine that the bank may claim a copyright on the printed check. Any idea ? Schutz 20:45, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

I haven't heard anything in over 2 months; I uploaded an image, with appropriate explanation and links, and will see what happens. Schutz 00:57, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Is it okay to publish the check with the electronic routing numbers and such un-obscured? I'm not sure, but doesn't that make it easy for someone to pilfer Knuth's checking account?

Actually, I have inverted and changed a few numbers before uploading the check ;-) It may have been easier to obscure them, indeed. Or maybe at least indicate the fact on the image page, which I will do. Schutz 18:28, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

Copyright does not apply to blank forms, which includes checks. If you think the upload was from a legit source, I wouldnt worrry about the included content.DGG 05:01, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Do you have a reference about this which could be added to the article ? The upload is without doubt from a legit source. Schutz 09:20, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Here's an authority for this; Copyright Office regulation 202.1(c):

§ 202.1   Material not subject to copyright.
 The following are examples of works not subject to copyright
and applications for registration of such works cannot be 
entertained:
 . . .
  (c) Blank forms, such as time cards, graph paper, account 
books, diaries, bank checks, scorecards, address books, report
forms, order forms and the like, which are designed for
recording information and do not in themselves convey
information;

So there's no copyright in the check itself. The filling in of the information does not render it copyrightable either; that's just the operative facts of the date, amount, and signatory, which are not protected by copyright.

Terry Carroll 21:45, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Chinese name

That he has a Chinese name is interesting, but not really material for the top of the article. Where should it be moved to? -- Steven Fisher 15:04, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Nowhere, just remove it ? :) --Papadopa 08:06, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

LR Parsing

Neither the page on LR-Parsing nor this one mentions that D. Knuth invented it. I found this a little surprising. Is it disputed, maybe? Is it not important enough to warrant mention on this article (in which case, it should probably be on the aforementioned LR-Parsing article)? I can't really stop by to discuss this, but I thought I'd bring it up in case it interested anyone. 81.109.92.212 01:50, 6 September 2006 (UTC) Ferret

LaTeX

Does Donald Knuth use LaTeX? And is there any opinions of TeX creator about LaTeX system?

Kefeer 10:32, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Of course not. He uses his own format, i.e. plain.--Oneiros 13:08, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I once got an humorous email from him which noted "No Latex". He does know and see Leslie Lamport on occasion. 171.66.33.155 (talk) 23:54, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Copyvio

It would be nice if these tags had been discussed.

The phrasing on parts such as the finders' fee at first looks identical to that on the ACM page: however, that ACM page is marked as being (c) 2006, whereas the exact same phrasing appears on a four-year-old version of this page. I'm suspicious that the copying was in the other direction.

Without further evidence that this is really copyvio I'm inclined to remove these tags. Chris Cunningham 10:19, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

See also WP:ANI#Possible copyvio involving ACM and Wikipedia... but who copied who? Chris Cunningham 15:15, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Jon Bentley

Jon Bentley was a student of Donald Knuth according to the Dr. Dobb's Excellence in Programming Award citation, 2000-04 [8]: "wrote his undergraduate paper ... under the direction of Donald E. Knuth". Roger Hui 16:50, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Surreal Numbers

I added a short paragraph on the book Surreal Numbers ISBN 0-201-03812-9. I thought it was enough different from Knuth's other works in that it is not computer related and deals only with pure math. The sentence about Knuth's intentions are based on comments in the post script. I didn't think it fit in particularly well where I put it, but I couldn't think of a better place for it.

Zzzzort 18:36, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Knuth vol4.jpg

Image:Knuth vol4.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 21:41, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

DEK and Wikipedia

The sentence “Knuth is a fan of Wikipedia, but he's a bit leery of the concept, saying that he would not want to have to remain forever on guard after making technically complex contributions, lest his comments be badly reedited.” has been edited by Don himself on 2007-11-27T19:15:58. How does one make such an edit into a reference for the article?--Oneiros (talk) 14:22, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

• How about putting a link http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_Knuth&diff=174165164&oldid=173688749 to the diff between the version resulting from Knuth's edits and the previous version? Roger Hui (talk) 15:55, 26 April 2008 (UTC)
  • I am glad if Don Knuth really edited his entry and clarified his views on Wikipedia, but come on — a Stanford IP address claiming "I am Don Knuth" is not a reference by any standard, and definitively not according to Wikipedia:Verifiability. There is no way we can turn this information into a reference. In any case, this looks like a minor, self-referential point: his opinion about the many collaborative web sites does not really belong in this article. I'd say we keep the paragraph here on the talk page for internal reference and remove it from the article, solving the problem of reference at the same time. Schutz (talk) 08:46, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
    • I have a mail from Don's secretary account by him verifying this. You won't get more out of him.--Oneiros (talk) 11:07, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
      • I hear you, and I'm convinced that it is true, but it remains an uncitable source (it is not a published text or anything). If we had it in a published interview, for example, that would be ok. Schutz (talk) 21:12, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
        • Would a letter by him published in the TUGboat suffice?--Oneiros (talk) 22:03, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

It may be relevant to this discussion that according to [9] and [10], Donald and Jill Knuth donated more than $1000 to Wikimedia Foundation in April 2008. — Emil J. 11:35, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The edit is gone. Nice. He's right not to put too much effort in this cesspit. 77.239.254.15 (talk) 11:59, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

A reference for him doing the edit in a published talk is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDokMxVtB3k , around minute 19-23. He speaks there a bit more about Wikipedia. Enjoy --denny vrandečić (talk) 22:01, 17 February 2013 (UTC)

Death hoax

Does anyone know the actual story behind this infamous edit and this one a short time later by the same user (user:Oppo) falsely reporting Knuth's death on Thanksgiving Day in 2004? The same user did two edits to this article and one edit to Wikipedia's recent deaths list, and those three are that user's whole edit history. Michael Hardy (talk) 00:14, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

External links

The following link needs to be updated because Peoples Archive has now been moved to a new website called Web of Stories:

• Donald Knuth video at the Peoples Archive (Donald Knuth, telling his life story, in 2007)

The correct link to the Web of Stories website (http://webofstories.com) should be:

• Donald Knuth video at Web of Stories

Fitzrovia calling (talk) 10:19, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Link fixed.—Emil J. 11:02, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Merger proposal

I propose that Selected papers series of Knuth be merged into this article by adding it to the Works section. Alternatively, move all of Knuth's works to a new article. I think the former is the best solution so I am going to begin by adding the details in the selected papers article to the Works section in this article. --178.208.197.76 (talk) 19:38, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Agree See wp:merge--Oneiros (talk) 21:02, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

References

There is one reference from his Health concerns section (nr 13: ^ Great Lives – Donald Knuth, Coping with cancer.) that directs to WoS but the link is broken. Can someone fix it? The correct link is:

• Donald Knuth talks about coping with cancer

HappyLarry88 (talk) 11:49, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Done   Davemck (talk) 16:25, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Possible Plagiarism

On the bottom of page 208 of Discrete Math and its Applications (Rosen, 7th edition), there is a blurb about Donald Knuth with text almost identical to what is written here, especially regarding the story of Ziegler's Giant Bar. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.76.106.210 (talk) 18:19, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

too detailed an article

human race is crazy about fashionable things.

knuth and dijakstra are both great but both are overrated.

yes but knuths work is mostly in discrete maths and not extremely outstanding. counting in many ways is difficult and ingenious but one should not ignore he fact thatknuth has ot domne much work in chalenging aeslike topology , several complex variables. even mathematical computer science godels work is of much philosophical value and significance than Knuths.

people working in fashionbale areas like computer science get limeight!

the art of computer programming is dificult to ead concrete maths has ealy nothing very reat to stimulate intellect. it is merely ashinableto refer the art of computer programing . some books are best as eferences but not to be ead

with human life becoming so fast and knledge expanding writings need to be lucid. Human race hypocritely des not consider one as a grat mahematician if writing is not terse! `Anilped (talk)anilped —Preceding undated comment added 17:36, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Photo caption "Parens"

This caption appears to the photograph: "Nested parens"—Donald Knuth and Jacob Appelbaum and Donald Knuth

It seems to be a slip, since DK appears twice, but I can't work out if there is a joke I've missed. Unless someone can explain it, I will remove the first occurrence of "Donald Knuth". Imaginatorium (talk) 10:20, 30 April 2015 (UTC)

If you try editing you should see an explanation or try putting your mouse over the first Donald Knuth. There seems to be a stray 'and' in the comment which you could move or remove. Dmcq (talk) 22:47, 30 April 2015 (UTC)

Award with no source (and no reference)

"In recognition of Knuth's contributions to the field of computer science, in 1990 he was awarded the one-of-a-kind academic title of Professor of The Art of Computer Programming, which has since been revised to Professor Emeritus of The Art of Computer Programming."

If this actually happened, then the source of the award should be included (Stanford? The King of Sweden?), and a reference would be nice.

WikiAlto (talk) 03:26, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Trivia or humor ?

Mikkalai,

Sorry, but indeed, I don't 'get' how 3:16 Bible Texts Illuminated qualifies as humor. I could, as you wrote in your edit summary, live with this, but I'd rather have someone explain it to me. Everything else in this section I am happy to call 'humor'. Schutz 21:16, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

The humor is selection of the number 3:16. Why not 1:1 or "3:3"? Not to say that the phrase in question is not about the book, but about the bounty for errata. If it is not funny to you, it is your problem. mikka (t) 23:44, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

'T ain't funny, McGee. Problem solved.Lestrade 13:49, 22 March 2006 (UTC)Lestrade

Keep the humor! In a biography it makes part of the full picture of the person, but here it is not yet integrated into a fullness. The article contains good facts, but there's no full picture of the thinking of Knuth, except that he's alive/well and dealing with important mathematical aspects of programming (a minor, but fundamental part of it all). Said: Rursus ☺ ★ 18:39, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

While on the subject of humour, it sez here that "He is the author of the multi-volume work The Art of Computer Programming.[4]." The Art of Computer Programming of course has three volumes, just like the Doug Adams trilogy.

David Lloyd-Jones (talk) 21:23, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Copyright violations

Both of the flagged copyright violations came from User:Icosahedronman1 (contributions). Here is a comparison of the article before and after he edited it. All of the text he added was plagiarized from the page in the copyvio box. ~ LukeShu (talk) 16:57, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

Claims to have found 4500 words using the characters contained within the string "Ziegler's Giant Bar"

I was intrigued by this claim, so I wrote a program that attempted to form words using those letters and checking against a combination of the unix american-english dictionary combined with the scrabble dictionary (ospd.txt), With each token being able to be used once (ie, like taking letters from a scrabble board to form a word) you get 3040 possible words. If you can reuse letters, you can get up to 3947 possible words. I call bulls..

Ok, wait, I retried using the words.txt file from https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dwyl/english-words/master/words.txt and I was able to hit 4975 results without tile reuse and 6623 words with tile reuse. And he did this in the 1950s. Amazing. Without pruning, it would have taken something like 2 years to brute force this on a modern 8 core machine (under 2s runtime with pruning) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.76.206.30 (talk) 22:22, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

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Appelbaum image

I’d suggest deleting the snapshot with Jacob Appelbaum. It isn’t relevant and associates Knuth with Appelbaum, who has been ejected from several software communities for sexual harassment. This is not damnatio memoriae—since Appelbaum is mentioned nowhere else in the article, there is simply no reason to keep it. --AgonRex (talk) 21:25, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

It is a good illustration of Knuth's humor. I see no reason to remove it. Also it is not Wikipedia's job to do extra pure whitening of bios removing any and everything which some idiot might possibly think implied something it doesn't. Dmcq (talk) 22:32, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

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MathJax!

Donald Knuth's Lex mathematics typesetting language is often used on many websites via the JavaScript-based system known as MathJax. This system is available even on certain public comment pages.

Here is an example showing the determinant of a 2x2 matrix:

${\begin{vmatrix}a&b\\c&d\end{vmatrix}}=ad-bc$

Unfortunately, there is no mention of MathJax in this article. I hesitate to add a section about MathJax, since it is based on Knuth's work and was not created by Knuth. But I feel that he should be credited with this particular and important contribution to the field of mathematics. David Spector (talk) 14:56, 24 December 2022 (UTC)