Seymour Ginsburg was an American pioneer of automata theory, formal language theory, and database theory, in particular; and computer science, in general.
24 Facts About Seymour Ginsburg
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Seymour Ginsburg's work was influential in distinguishing theoretical Computer Science from the disciplines of Mathematics and Electrical Engineering.
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Seymour Ginsburg turned his attention wholly towards computer science in 1955 when he moved to California to work for the Northrop Corporation.
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Seymour Ginsburg followed this with positions at the National Cash Register Corporation, Hughes Aircraft, and System Development Corporation.
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At SDC, Seymour Ginsburg first concentrated on the theory of abstract machines.
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Seymour Ginsburg subsequently formed and led a research project dedicated to formal language theory and the foundations of Computer Science.
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Al Aho credited Ullman's summer with Seymour Ginsburg as being highly influential on Aho's career in Computer Science.
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However, after Ullman returned from his summer with Seymour Ginsburg, Aho stated that Ullman "essentially taught Hopcroft, and me, formal language theory".
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Seymour Ginsburg joined the faculty of University of Southern California in 1966 where he helped to establish the Computer Science department in 1968.
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Seymour Ginsburg was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1974 and spent the year touring the world, lecturing on the areas of theoretical Computer Science which he had helped to create.
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Seymour Ginsburg was named the first Fletcher Jones Professor of Computer Science at USC in 1978, a chair he held until his retirement in 1999.
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Seymour Ginsburg continued his work on formal language theory and automata through the 1970s.
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At USC in the 1980s, Seymour Ginsburg created a research group dedicated to database theory.
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Seymour Ginsburg organized the first PODS in Marina del Rey in 1982 and was a moving force at the conference into the 1990s.
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Seymour Ginsburg was honored with a surprise session at the 1992 PODS on the occasion of his 64th birthday.
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Seymour Ginsburg's career ended suddenly in 1999 when he was diagnosed with the onset of Alzheimer's disease.
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Seymour Ginsburg retired from active teaching and became Professor Emeritus of Computer Science at USC.
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Seymour Ginsburg spent his last years in declining health until dying on December 5,2004.
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Seymour Ginsburg was remembered fondly in a memorial published in the ACM SIGMOD Record in 2005.
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Seymour Ginsburg was remembered for his generous support of younger researchers.
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Seymour Ginsburg turned his attention to formal language theory in the 1960s.
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Seymour Ginsburg studied context-free grammars and published a well-known comprehensive overview of context-free languages in 1966.
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Seymour Ginsburg was the first to observe the connection between context-free languages and "ALGOL-like" languages.
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Seymour Ginsburg continued to work in this field until his retirement.