Tony Hoare facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Sir Tony Hoare
FRS FREng
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Tony Hoare in 2011
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| Born |
Charles Antony Richard Hoare
11 January 1934 |
| Education | |
| Known for |
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| Spouse(s) | Jill Pym |
| Children | 3 |
| Awards |
Turing Award (1980)
Harry H. Goode Memorial Award (1981) Faraday Medal (1985) Computer Pioneer Award (1990) Kyoto Prize (2000) IEEE John von Neumann Medal (2011) Royal Medal (2023) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Computer science |
| Institutions |
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| Doctoral students |
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Sir Charles Antony Richard Hoare, often called Tony Hoare, is a famous British computer scientist. He was born on January 11, 1934. He made many important discoveries in how computers work and how we write computer programs.
His work helped create programming languages, algorithms (steps for computers to follow), and operating systems. He also worked on making sure programs work correctly and how computers can do many things at once. In 1980, he won the Turing Award. This award is like the Nobel Prize for computer science.
Tony Hoare created a very fast way to sort information called quicksort in 1959–1960. He also developed Hoare logic, which is a way to prove that computer programs are correct. He invented a special language called communicating sequential processes (CSP). This language helps describe how different parts of a computer program talk to each other. Since 1977, he has worked at the University of Oxford and Microsoft Research.
Contents
Early Life and Learning
Tony Hoare was born in Colombo, which is now Sri Lanka. His parents were British. His father worked for the government, and his mother's father grew tea. Tony went to school in England at the Dragon School and the King's School.
He then went to Merton College, Oxford to study Classics and Philosophy. After college in 1956, he joined the Royal Navy for 18 months. There, he learned to speak Russian. In 1958, he went back to the University of Oxford to study statistics. This is where he started learning to program computers. He learned a language called Autocode. Later, he went to Moscow State University in Russia. He studied how computers could translate languages.
Tony Hoare's Discoveries and Career
In 1960, Tony Hoare started working at Elliott Brothers Ltd. This was a small company in London that made computers. He helped create a computer language called ALGOL 60. He also started making important algorithms there.
He helped set up rules for programming around the world. He was part of a group that worked on languages like ALGOL 60. In 1968, he became a professor at the Queen's University of Belfast. Then, in 1977, he moved back to University of Oxford. He led a special group that researched programming. He retired from Oxford in 2000. Today, he is still a professor there and works at Microsoft Research in England.
Tony Hoare's most important work includes:
- Quicksort: A very fast way to sort lists of things.
- Hoare logic: A system to prove that computer programs work correctly.
- Communicating Sequential Processes (CSP): A language to describe how different parts of a program work together.
- Monitors: A way to organize computer operating systems.
- Axiomatic specification: A method to clearly define how programming languages should work.
The "Billion-Dollar Mistake"
In 2009, Tony Hoare joked about a mistake he made in 1965. He called it his "billion-dollar mistake." He was creating a system for a programming language. He wanted to make sure that all parts of the program were safe. But he added something called a "null reference." This was easy to do.
However, this "null reference" has caused many computer errors and crashes. He said it has caused "a billion dollars of pain and damage" over the years.
Awards and Special Recognitions
Tony Hoare has received many awards for his work in computer science. These awards show how much he changed the world of computing.
- ACM Programming Systems and Languages Paper Award (1973)
- Distinguished Fellow of the British Computer Society (1978)
- Turing Award (1980) for his work on programming languages.
- Harry H. Goode Memorial Award (1981)
- Fellow of the Royal Society (1982)
- Honorary Doctorate from the Queen's University Belfast (1987)
- Honorary Doctorate from the University of Bath (1993)
- Honorary Fellow, Kellogg College, Oxford (1998)
- Knighted by the Queen for his work in education and computer science (2000).
- Kyoto Prize for Information Science (2000)
- Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering (2005)
- Member of the National Academy of Engineering (2006)
- Computer History Museum Fellow (2006) for Quicksort and programming languages.
- Honorary Doctorate from Heriot-Watt University (2007)
- Honorary Doctorate from the Athens University of Economics and Business (2007)
- Friedrich L. Bauer-Prize (2007)
- SIGPLAN Programming Languages Achievement Award (2011)
- IEEE John von Neumann Medal (2011)
- Honorary Doctorate, University of Warsaw (2012)
- Honorary Doctorate, Complutense University of Madrid (2013)
- Royal Medal of the Royal Society (2023)
Personal Life
In 1962, Tony Hoare married Jill Pym. Jill was also part of his research team.
Books by Tony Hoare
Tony Hoare has written books about computer science. One of his well-known books is:
- C. A. R. Hoare (1985). Communicating Sequential Processes. This book is about how different parts of a computer program can work together.
See also
In Spanish: C. A. R. Hoare para niños
