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| | John Backus |
 | | Besides FORTRAN, Backus also developed BNF (Backus Normal Form or Backus Naur Form, an application of Noam Chomsky's generative grammar to formal computer languages), the language that is used to formally describe computer languages, and was principal author of the Algol 60 Revised Report. |
 | | The caption reads: "John Backus, leader of the group which developed FORTRAN (1954-57), was an early SSEC programmer." After serving in the US Army in World War II, Backus received his BS in mathematics from Columbia's School of General Studies in 1949 (and, I believe, he also earned a Columbia Masters, year unknown). |
 | | Backus, John W., "The IBM 701 Speedcoding System", IBM, New York (10 Sep 1953), 4pp. |
| www.columbia.edu /acis/history/backus.html (474 words) |
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