Bernard A. Galler (October 3, 1928 – September 4, 2006) was an American mathematician and computer scientist at the

University of Michigan The University of Michigan (U-M, U of M, or Michigan) is a public university, public research university in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest institution of higher education in the state. The University of Mi ...

who was involved in the development of large-scale operating systems and computer languages including the MAD programming language and the

Michigan Terminal System The Michigan Terminal System (MTS) is one of the first time-sharing computer operating systems.. Created in 1967 at the University of Michigan for use on IBM System/360, IBM S/360-67, S/370 and compatible mainframe computers, it was developed and ...

operating system.

Education and career

Galler attended the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

where he earned a BSc in mathematics at the

(1947), followed by a MSc from

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the C ...

and a PhD from the

(1955), advised by

Paul Halmos Paul Richard Halmos (; 3 March 1916 – 2 October 2006) was a Kingdom of Hungary, Hungarian-born United States, American mathematician and probabilist who made fundamental advances in the areas of mathematical logic, probability theory, operat ...

and Marshall Stone. He joined the mathematics department at the

(1955) where he taught the first programming course (1956) using an

IBM 704 The IBM 704 is the model name of a large digital computer, digital mainframe computer introduced by IBM in 1954. Designed by John Backus and Gene Amdahl, it was the first mass-produced computer with hardware for floating-point arithmetic. The I ...

. Galler helped to develop the computer language called the Michigan Algorithm Decoder (1959-) in use at several universities. He formed the Communication Sciences dept (1965), renamed Computer Sciences (CS), which became the Computer and Communications (CCS) dept (1984), and Computer Science Department in the 70s, where he retired in 1994. Galler's class developed the realtime course scheduling program called Computer Registration Involving Student Participation (CRISP) which allowed students to register for courses without waiting in long lines. The University used the CRISP application for over fifteen years. From 1968 to 1970, Prof. Galler was the President of the

Association for Computing Machinery The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) is a US-based international learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 and is the world's largest scientific and educational computing society. The ACM is a non-profit professional membe ...

(ACM). In 1994 he was inducted as a

Fellow A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned society, learned or professional society, p ...

of the

. He was the founding editor of the journal ''

IEEE Annals of the History of Computing The ''IEEE Annals of the History of Computing'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal published by the IEEE Computer Society. It covers the history of computing, computer science, and computer hardware. It was founded in 1979 by the Ame ...

'' (1979–87). He was also the President of the Software Patent Institute (1992). For fifteen years, he served as an expert witness in numerous important legal cases around the country involving computer software issues.

Personal life

Galler was married to Enid Harris, played violin in several orchestras and chamber groups, co-founded the Ypsilanti Youth Orchestra (2001) for children whose schools did not have string music education. He was president of the Orchestra Board at the University of Michigan and a member of the Ann Arbor chapter of

Rotary International Rotary International is one of the largest service organizations in the world. The self-declared mission of Rotary, as stated on its website, is to "provide service to others, promote integrity, and advance world understanding, goodwill, and p ...

. He died from

pulmonary embolism Pulmonary embolism (PE) is a blockage of an pulmonary artery, artery in the lungs by a substance that has moved from elsewhere in the body through the bloodstream (embolism). Symptoms of a PE may include dyspnea, shortness of breath, chest pain ...

. The Bernard A. Galler Fellowship Fund Bernard A. Galler Fellowship Fund
Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Michigan, accessed February 5, 2013 has been established at the University of Michigan Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science to "attract and support outstanding graduate students pursuing an advanced degree in computer science."

References

External links

*
Oral history interview with Bernard A. Galler

Charles Babbage Institute The IT History Society (ITHS) is an organization that supports the history and scholarship of information technology by encouraging, fostering, and facilitating archival and historical research. Formerly known as the Charles Babbage Foundation, ...

, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. Galler describes the development of computer science at the University of Michigan from the 1950s through the 1980s and discusses his own work in computer science. Galler also discusses Michigan's relationship with

ARPANET The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) was the first wide-area packet-switched network with distributed control and one of the first computer networks to implement the TCP/IP protocol suite. Both technologies became the tec ...

, CSNET, and

BITNET BITNET was a co-operative United States, U.S. university computer network founded in 1981 by Ira Fuchs at the City University of New York (CUNY) and Greydon Freeman at Yale University. The first network link was between CUNY and Yale. Backgrou ...

. He describes the atmosphere on campus in the 1960s and early 1970s and his various administrative roles at the university. Galler discusses his involvement with the

, the American Federation of Information Processing Societies, the founding of the

, and his work with the

Annals of the History of Computing The ''IEEE Annals of the History of Computing'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal published by the IEEE Computer Society. It covers the history of computing, computer science, and computer hardware. It was founded in 1979 by the Amer ...

.
A Day in the Life of Bernard Galler
ACM Crossroads (no date)
The Mathematics Genealogy Project: Bernard Galler
Department of Mathematics, North Dakota State University

DBLP Computer Science Bibliography
Bernard Galler's obituary
in the University Record, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, November 8, 2006. {{DEFAULTSORT:Galler, Bernard 1928 births 2006 deaths American computer scientists 20th-century American educators 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians Deaths from pulmonary embolism Scientists from Chicago Academics from Ann Arbor, Michigan University of Chicago alumni University of Michigan faculty Presidents of the Association for Computing Machinery University of California, Los Angeles alumni Engineers from Illinois Mathematicians from Illinois 1994 fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery