MbShea@PWP@English@UMCP

Audience : People in the field of computer science; especially students who are learning his algorithms. In addition, teachers of computer science who want to learn more about the creator of the algorithms they are teaching.

Context: Often times students are being taught algorithms created by Knuth however he is rarely given all the credit he deserves. His work is spread across all specialties of computer science and should be known by all computer scientists. I will also briefly look into the work of Knuth outside the field of computer science.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to educate computer scientists about the background of the material they are learning and where it is coming from. I believe providing this context will help students be more interested in the material they are learning.

DOCUMENT TYPE : Review of Knuth’s work as well as a summary of his overall impact on the field. Partially a biography of his overall life works and how they impact the field of computer science. Will also include a review of Knuth’s publishing, The Art of Computer Programming.

Design/format: A brief overview of Knuth’s entrance into the field of computer science. I will briefly look into the work of Knuth outside the field of computer science and get a picture of him as a whole. Then, a summary of some of his most impactful algorithms and a review of his published work, The Art of Computer Programming. A look into how his work is integrated into the studies of a computer science student and a discussion of the lack of credit given.

Citation style: Some APA formatted citations for Knuth’s published works as well as natural language citations with hyperlinks for his own website and other more informal sources.

Knuth's work was really fundamental in building the modern field of Computer Science. It would be cool to learn about the many other things that be worked on besides the stuff they only briefly taught us in class. But seeing Knuth's name gives me bad 351 flashbacks.

I have the first three books of the art of programming books series by Knuth and have cited him repeatedly but I have never read enough about the what all he has done. This seems like a really interesting read an would love to read it!

E, you have two really positive responses here. Can you address the Knuth flashback problem? As in, yes, this work is extremely difficult but well worth the deep dive?

I hope you WILL place on GitHub. At the very least, can you edit his Wikipedia entry to reflect some of your new knowledge?

And, next semester, I hope I can encourage someone to write about Ben Shneiderman.