Re: Invention of the stack
Date: Sat, 03 Feb 2007 22:41:52 GMT
Message-ID: <Qc8xh.2066$R71.30214_at_ursa-nb00s0.nbnet.nb.ca>
Walt wrote:
> Bob Badour attributed the invention of stacks to Djikstra. I would have
> supposed that John McCarthy invented stacks somewhat earlier.
>
> Does anyone know whether Djikstra got the idea for stacks from someone else,
> or invented it independently?
> Does anyone know whether stacks (sometimes called pushdown lists in the
> early literature) predate McCarthy's development of Lisp?
First, I should point out that Dijkstra, himself, gives credit to several others who apparently came up with the same idea at around the same time he did.
Wikipedia dates the publication of LISP at 1960 versus the stack at 1959:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McCarthy_(computer_scientist)
I can find no fault in pursuing a legacy of ingenious triviality. Received on Sat Feb 03 2007 - 23:41:52 CET