John W. Backus, 82, Fortran Developer, Dies

The New York Times obituary section notes the death of John Backus, who led the team to develop the FORTRAN. I suspect the members of the priesthood, coding in machine code, were the ones saying it was an impossible task. It is difficult to see how something so seemingly obvious could be such a struggle to achieve, but that is the way with hindsight. It is difficult and daunting to face into the wind. It takes courage and persistence. Words to live by:

“You need the willingness to fail all the time,” he said. “You have to generate many ideas and then you have to work very hard only to discover that they don’t work. And you keep doing that over and over until you find one that does work.” -- John W. Backus

(http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/19/obituaries/20cnd-backus.html 19 Mar 2007)

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