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This article is about Alan Kotok who was associate chair of W3C. Alan B. Kotok who is the managing editor of Science Careers is also called Alan Kotok.
File:Alan Photo.jpeg
Alan Kotok at CSAIL in 2006. Photo: Ralph R. Swick

Alan Kotok (November 9, 1941 – May 26, 2006) was an American computer scientist. He was known for his contributions to the Internet and World Wide Web through his work at the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), to computer engineering through his work at Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), and to gaming for his work on computer game and computer chess programs built at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Kotok recorded a video oral history at the Computer History Museum in 2004.

Kotok appears in Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution by Steven Levy.

Kotok was born in 1941 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania[1] though his family lived in Vineland in southern New Jersey. He was an only child. By age 3, Kotok survived an inquiry into an electrical outlet with a screwdriver, and by age 6, he could build and wire household lamps.[2] Kotok learned model railroading at his father's hardware store. Kotok skipped two grades and started college at age 16.[3]

MIT days

At MIT, Kotok earned bachelor's and master's degrees in electrical engineering.[4] He had influential teachers including Jack Dennis and John McCarthy. Kotok was a member of the Signals and Power Subcommittee of the Tech Model Railroad Club (TMRC) which he joined soon after starting college in 1958.[1]

While a graduate student and member of TMRC, Dennis introduced his students to the TX-0 on loan to MIT indefinitely from Lincoln Laboratory. In the spring of 1959, McCarthy taught the first course in programming MIT offered to freshmen.[5] Outside classes, David Gross, Kotok, Peter Samson, Robert A. Saunders and Robert A. Wagner, all friends from TMRC, reserved time. They were able to use the TX-0 as a personal, single-user tool rather than a batch processing system, thanks to Dennis, faculty advisors and John McKenzie, the operations manager.[1][6]

In September 1961 DEC donated a PDP-1 with about 9 MB of memory and a Type 30 precision CRT display. Dennis oversaw the PDP-1 lab, located next door to the TX-0. Students from TMRC worked as support staff, programming the new computer.

Chess

From A chess playing program for the IBM 7090

MIT classmates Elwyn Berlekamp, Kotok, Michael Lieberman, Charles Niessen and Wagner began to develop McCarthy's IBM 704 chess-playing program in 1959. Kotok describes their work in MIT Artificial Intelligence Project Memo 41 and his bachelor's thesis. By the time "the chess group" graduated in 1962, their program played chess "comparable to an amateur with about 100 games experience" on an IBM 7090.[7][8]

Although they came to know a great deal about the game, neither Kotok nor McCarthy were known as chess players — later in life Kotok loved bridge.[9] Yet in his Computer Chess History, Bill Wall calls the MIT program the first to play chess credibly.

After moving to Stanford University, McCarthy visited the Soviet Union in 1965[10] where the program was challenged to a match with a program developed by a group using an M-20[11] computer in Alexander Kronrod’s laboratory at the Moscow Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics (ITEP). Completed by telegraph over nine months in 1966-1967, the match was the first played by two computer programs.[12] Georgy Adelson-Velsky, Vladimir Arlazarov, Alexander Bitman, Anatoly Uskov and Alexander Zhivotovsky had a superior program that depended on a brute force strategy similar to the Type A approach described in 1950 by Claude Shannon.[13] Possibly not an advantage in computer chess even today, Kotok-McCarthy used a selective approach, similar to Shannon's Type B. Playing without the alpha-beta pruning and killer heuristic techniques developed after "the chess group" graduated, Kotok-McCarthy drew with the weak version of the ITEP program used in games one and two, and lost the match to the strong version used in games three and four.[12]

In a copy of Kotok's thesis that he saw at Stanford, Richard Greenblatt thought "7 7" would have done better than "4 3 2 2 1 1 1 1 0 0" in the REPLYS subroutine which generated each player's next plausible moves. He was inspired to make improvements at MIT in 1965.[14] In 1967 Greenblatt's program MacHack VI became an honorary member of the United States Chess Federation when a person lost to it in tournament play.[15]

Spacewar!

A control box for Spacewar! and T-Square

Martin Graetz, Stephen Russell and Wayne Wiitanen conceived the computer game Spacewar! while working at Harvard University in 1961. Inspired by Minsky's Three Position Display they called the Minskytron, with their MIT classmates Dan Edwards, Kotok, Stephen D. Piner, Samson and Saunders, they had the first version running by early 1962. Coded by Russell, Spacewar! was one of the earliest interactive computer games.[16]

Kotok did not write any of the Spacewar! code. He did travel to DEC to obtain the sine and cosine routines that Russell needed. Graetz credited Kotok and Saunders with building the game controllers which allowed two people to play side by side.

Samson replaced what were at first random points of light with Expensive Planetarium. Edwards sped up the display of the spaceships and added the central star, the center of gravity. Graetz added hyperspace.[16]

From a printout that Graetz provided, Barry Silverman, Brian Silverman and Vadim Gerasimov transcribed the source code and built a Spacewar! Java applet in 1999.[17] MIT continues to serve the game at the MIT Media Lab Software Agents group where one can play Spacewar in a Web browser.[18]

Stewart Brand and Annie Leibovitz celebrated the game's success in Spacewar: Fanatic Life and Symbolic Death Among the Computer Bums in Rolling Stone magazine on or near Spacewar's 10th birthday in 1972. In the New York Times in 2002 on the game's 40th anniversary, John Markoff interviewed the creators of Spacewar in A Long Time Ago, in a Lab Far Away . . .[19]

Software

File:Mouse That Roared Panel 20060515.jpg
PDP-1 restoration celebrated in Mountain View, 2006. Image courtesy Computer History Museum

Edward Fredkin, at one time at BBN which was DEC's first customer for the PDP-1, McCarthy, Russell, Samson, Kotok and Harlan Anderson, and Gordon Bell on tape, met in May 2006 for a panel to celebrate the Computer History Museum's restoration of a PDP-1.

Their presentations show that TX-0 and PDP-1 users wrote some of the earliest application software. Piner wrote Expensive Typewriter which enabled the group to operate the TX-0 and PDP-1 directly. Wagner wrote Expensive Desk Calculator. On a second PDP-1 in the physics department, Daniel L. Murphy wrote the TECO text editor, later used to implement Emacs. Samson wrote TJ-2, an early page layout program, and implemented the War card game. Collaboration on computing waveforms with Dennis on the TX-0 led to Samson writing the Harmony Compiler with which PDP-1 users coded music. Kotok and Samson worked together on a drafting program. Named after a T-square, it used a Spacewar! controller to move the cursor.[20]

Early PDP-1 users wrote programming software including an assembler translated from the TX-0 over one weekend in 1961. Kotok wrote the DDT online debugging program translated from the FLIT debugger for the TX-0. Kotok later wrote an interpreter for the Lisp programming language in TECO macros.

DEC days

In 1961 Kotok began at DEC writing a Fortran compiler for the PDP-4.[21] He next worked on the PDP-5 instruction set. Part of a team led by principal architect Gordon Bell under Anderson who was vice president of engineering, Kotok was an assistant logic designer of the first commercial time-sharing computer, the PDP-6. Beginning with the PDP-6, designed and delivered in 1963-1964 for scientific use, DEC machines had a 36-bit word length to accommodate artificial intelligence work in Lisp and to compare with IBM mainframe computers.[22]

In what may have been the first around-the-world networking connection, a PDP-6 at the University of Western Australia in Perth was operated from Boston in the United States via a telex link in 1965. DEC photographed Bell and Kotok at a PDP-6.

Kotok became the principal architect and designer of several generations of the PDP-10, DECsystem-10 and DECsystem-20. Bell, Thomas Hastings, Richard Hill and Kotok wrote that the DECSystem-10 accelerated the transition from batch processing to time-sharing and single-user systems.[23]

Kotok was also system architect of the VAX 8600, known as Venus. Up to 4.2 times faster than the standard at the time, the VAX 8600 was the highest performance computer system in DEC history when it was introduced in 1984.[24]

In his 34 year career at DEC, Kotok held senior engineering positions in storage, telecommunications and software. As technical director of the Corporate Strategy Group, Kotok was instrumental in creating the Internet Business Group which advocated early adoption and integration of Internet and Web-based technologies.

DEC brought forth the AltaVista search engine, the Internet firewall, the Web portal, the Webcast and live election returns.[25][26] Through difficult times, DEC continued its lead in developing for the Internet and Web. But Kotok sought a direction different from the corporate strategy of the time that he felt consumed Web and Internet resources to sell DEC products like the Alpha server.[27] For one example, he saw a missed opportunity in Millicent, the micropayment system that could buy and sell Web content for fractions of a U.S. cent.[28]

Kotok was a corporate consulting engineer for DEC 1962–1997, W3C Advisory Committee representative for DEC 1994-1996, vice president of marketing for GC Tech Inc. 1996–1997, member of the Science Advisory Board for Cylink Corp., a consultant for Compaq, and a content advisor for the Computer History Museum.

At Berlekamp's suggestion, for nine months during the 1975-1976 academic year Kotok taught logic design at the University of California, Berkeley.[1]

Kotok earned a master's degree in business adminstration from Clark University in 1978.

DEC and GC Tech were early W3C members and were among the sponsors of the Fourth International World Wide Web Conference (WWW4) in 1995 in Boston. Kotok coordinated a BoF on Selection of Payment Vehicle for Internet Purchases on April 7, 1997 at WWW6 in Santa Clara, California.[29] In La Jolla, California, he presented Micropayment Systems to the Electronic Payments Forum in 1997.[30]

W3C

File:Alan-kotok-w3c10-small.jpg
Alan Kotok speaking in Boston in 2004. Photo: Richard Ishida

While at DEC Kotok recognized the Web's potential, and went on to help found the World Wide Web Consortium. Early in 1994 in Zürich, Switzerland, Tim Berners-Lee had met with Michael Dertouzos to discuss starting a new organization at MIT. In April 1994, Kotok, Steve Fink, Gail Grant and Brian Reid from DEC travelled to CERN in Geneva to speak with Berners-Lee about the need for a consortium to create open standards and to coordinate Web development. Berners-Lee mentions the pivotal meeting with DEC in Weaving the Web.[31]

Kotok joined W3C as associate chairman in May 1997.

Kotok recruited hundreds of W3C members and represented their interests. He managed the W3C host site at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) where he was a research scientist. He headed the worldwide W3C Systems and Web Team who serve the millions of pages and resources in the W3C Web site and its mailing list archives.

Kotok managed contractual relations with W3C hosts, member organizations and offices. He helped to establish new W3C offices in India and China. He worked with the W3C management team, the W3C Advisory Board and an internal task force to reduce membership fees in developing countries. Kotok chaired the HTML and Voice Browser Patent Advisory Groups and was a major contributor to the W3C Patent Policy.

Kotok briefly led the Technology and Society domain which at the time consisted of W3C activity on digital signatures, electronic commerce, public policy, PICS, RDF metadata, privacy, and security.

Family

Kotok lived in the United States in Cambridge, Massachusetts and Cape May, New Jersey with his wife Judith Kotok who was a choir director and piano teacher.[32] They were fond of 16th and 17th century music and pipe organs. The Kotoks photographed their tour of historic organs in Germany in 2004. At the time of her death in 2005, Judie Kotok was on the faculty of the Longy School of Music and directed the annual Youth Choir Week held in Cape May by the Episcopal Diocese of New Jersey. Judie Kotok co-founded Tech Squares at MIT in 1967. Kotok had a daughter, Leah Kotok, a stepdaughter, Frederica Beck, and a stepson, Daryl Beck.[2]

Kotok died of an apparent heart attack on May 26, 2006. He passed away at home in Cambridge.[2]

References

Wikiquote has quotations related to SusanLesch/Drafts.
  • Kotok, Alan (15 November2004). "Oral History of Alan Kotok" (PDF). Computer History Museum. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite journal requires |journal= (help)

Notes

  1. ^ a b c d Kotok, Alan (15 November2004). "Oral History of Alan Kotok" (PDF). Computer History Museum. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  2. ^ a b c Marquard, Bryan (6 June2006). "Alan Kotok; he tred vanguard of computers with brilliance, wit". The Boston Globe. The New York Times Company. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  3. ^ Markoff, John (3 June2006). "Alan Kotok, 64, a Pioneer In Computer Video Games". The New York Times. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  4. ^ "W3C Folio" (PDF). 1999. Retrieved 2006-07-01.
  5. ^
  6. ^ TX-0 alumni reunion (Spring 1984). "The Computer Museum Report, Volume 8". Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  7. ^ Kotok, Alan (undated). "MIT Artificial Intelligence Memo 41". Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  8. ^ Kotok, Alan (1962). "A chess playing program for the IBM 7090". Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Electrical Engineering. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  9. ^ "W3C mailing list archive for public-memoria@w3.org". W3C. 2006. Retrieved 2006-07-01.
  10. ^ McCarthy, John (2005). The History of Computer Chess: An AI Perspective 8 September2005. Mountain View, CA, USA: Computer History Museum. {{cite AV media}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); External link in |title= (help). McCarthy begins at 0:43.
  11. ^ "M-20 Computer". Russian Virtual Computer Museum. Retrieved 2006-07-01. (English version)
  12. ^ a b Brudno, Michael (undated). "Competitions, Controversies, and Computer Chess" (PDF). Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  13. ^ Shannon, Claude E. (March 1950). "Programming a Computer for Playing Chess" (PDF). Philosophical Magazine, Ser.7, Vol. 41, No. 314. Retrieved 2006-07-01.
  14. ^ Greenblatt, Richard D. (12 January2005). "Oral History of Richard Greenblatt" (PDF). Computer History Museum. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  15. ^ Greenblatt, Richard D., Eastlake, Donald E. III, and Crocker, Stephen D. (1969). "The Greenblatt Chess Program" (PDF). Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  16. ^ a b Graetz, J. Martin (August 1981, Spring 1983). "The origin of Spacewar!". Creative Computing and Creative Computing Video & Arcade Games. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  17. ^ Vadim Gerasimov (February 2004). "Vadim Gerasimov - Home - Feb 2004". Retrieved 2006-07-01.
  18. ^ "Spacewar and Readme". 1999, undated. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  19. ^ Markoff, John (28 February2002). "A Long Time Ago, in a Lab Far Away . . ". The New York Times. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  20. ^ Cite error: The named reference CHMMouse was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  21. ^ Peter Hurley, and Jack H. Stevens (1995). "A History of TOPS". Newsgroup: alt.sys.pdp10. 17a1d08377234f79. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite newsgroup}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  22. ^ "Twenty Years of 36-bit Computing with Digital 1964-1984". 1984. Retrieved 2006-07-01.
  23. ^ Bell, C. Gordon, Kotok, Alan, Hastings, Thomas N., and Hill, Richard (January 1978). "The evolution of the DECsystem 10". ACM. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  24. ^ "VAX 8600: 1984". DEC Timeline. undated. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  25. ^ "Internet/Intranet: 1977-1997". DEC Timeline. undated. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  26. ^ Stuart, Anne (June 1995). "Digital Rewired". WebMaster Magazine. Retrieved 2006-07-01.
  27. ^ Kotok, Alan (29 August2000). "DEC Internet Business Group page". Richard Seltzer, B&R Samizdat Express. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  28. ^ "Millicent: 1997". DEC Timeline. undated. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  29. ^ Khare, Rohit (1999). "W3C at WWW6". W3C. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  30. ^ "Meeting Report". Electronic Payments Forum. January 1997. Retrieved 2006-07-01.
  31. ^ Template:Harvard reference
  32. ^ "Kotok Family Home Page". undated. Retrieved 2006-07-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
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