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For people's information:

"All problems in computer science can be solved by another level of indirection." - Butler Lampson

And, from what limited sources I could find:

"[above] ... Except for the problem of too many layers of indirection" - David Wheeler



It's a shame Wheeler isn't better known. He invented the subroutine back in the '50s. Calling a subroutine used to be called a "Wheeler jump" (relevant to #4 in TFA).


His group with the EDSAC did some absolutely tremendous and groundbreaking work.

Wilkes, Wheeler, and Gill wrote a book, "Preparation of programs for an electronic digital computer", that pretty much describes the core software engineering precepts we use today - in 1951.

Gill wrote "The Diagnosis of Mistakes in Programmes on the EDSAC", which gives a good snip of what they were doing at the time. I think that it can be obtained for free online.


We need to educate people that there was computing before the advent of Web 2.0. There are riches in the past to be mined by those who will take their blindfolds off.




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