Severo M. Ornstein (born 1930) is a retired computer scientist and son of American composer

Leo Ornstein Leo Ornstein (born ''Лев Орнштейн'', ''Lev Ornshteyn''; – February 24, 2002) was an American experimental composer and pianist of the early twentieth century. His performances of works by avant-garde composers and his own innovative ...

. In 1955 he joined MIT's

Lincoln Laboratory The MIT Lincoln Laboratory, located in Lexington, Massachusetts, is a United States Department of Defense federally funded research and development center chartered to apply advanced technology to problems of national security. Research and de ...

as a programmer and designer for the SAGE air-defense system. He later joined the

TX-2 The MIT Lincoln Laboratory TX-2 computer was the successor to the Lincoln TX-0 and was known for its role in advancing both artificial intelligence and human–computer interaction. Wesley A. Clark was the chief architect of the TX-2. Speci ...

group and became a member of the team that designed the

LINC The LINC (Laboratory INstrument Computer) is a 12-bit, 2048-word transistorized computer. The LINC is considered by some the first minicomputer and a forerunner to the personal computer. Originally named the "Linc", suggesting the project's ori ...

. He moved with the team to

Washington University in St. Louis Washington University in St. Louis (WashU or WUSTL) is a private research university with its main campus in St. Louis County, and Clayton, Missouri. Founded in 1853, the university is named after George Washington. Washington University i ...

where he was one of the principal designers of macromodules. Returning to Boston he joined

Bolt, Beranek and Newman Raytheon BBN (originally Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc.) is an American research and development company, based next to Fresh Pond in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. In 1966, the Franklin Institute awarded the firm the Frank P. Brown ...

. When ARPA issued a Request for Proposal for the

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

, he joined the group that wrote the winning proposal. He was responsible for the design of the communication interfaces and other special hardware for the

Interface Message Processor The Interface Message Processor (IMP) was the packet switching In telecommunications, packet switching is a method of grouping Data (computing), data into ''network packet, packets'' that are transmitted over a digital Telecommunications netwo ...

. In 1972 he headed the first delegation of U.S. computer scientists to the

People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, sli ...

. In 1976, he joined

Xerox PARC PARC (Palo Alto Research Center; formerly Xerox PARC) is a research and development company in Palo Alto, California. Founded in 1969 by Jacob E. "Jack" Goldman, chief scientist of Xerox Corporation, the company was originally a division of Xer ...

where he implemented a computer interface to an early

laser printer Laser printing is an electrostatic digital printing process. It produces high-quality text and graphics (and moderate-quality photographs) by repeatedly passing a laser beam back and forth over a negatively-charged cylinder called a "drum" t ...

. Later he co-led (with Ed McCreight) the team that built the Dorado computer. Ornstein co-designed Mockingbird, the first interactive computer-based music-score editor, and oversaw its programming. In 1980 he was instrumental in starting

Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility (CPSR) was a global organization promoting the responsible use of computer technology. CPSR was incorporated in 1983 following discussions and organizing that began in 1981. It educated policymakers ...

(CPSR). He wrote an autobiography describing his experiences in computer science, published in 2002.

References

Oral history interview with Severo Ornstein

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. Ornstein describes his experience at Lincoln Laboratory which included work on the SAGE,

and

computers. He discusses his move to Washington University, and the later work there on DARPA/IPTO sponsored macromodule project. As the principal hardware designer of the

(IMP) for the

, Ornstein describes the IMP design work at

Bolt Beranek and Newman Raytheon BBN (originally Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc.) is an American research and development company, based next to Fresh Pond in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. In 1966, the Franklin Institute awarded the firm the Frank P. Brown ...

(BBN), the working environment of the group at BBN, his relationship with Lawrence Roberts, his interactions with Honeywell, and his work on the Pluribus multi-processor IMP. Ornstein also discusses the contributions of

Wesley Clark Wesley Kanne Clark (born December 23, 1944) is a retired United States Army officer. He graduated as valedictorian of the class of 1966 at West Point and was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to the University of Oxford, where he obtained a degree ...

and

Norman Abramson Norman Manuel Abramson (April 1, 1932biography
from

, and his views on artificial intelligence and time-sharing.
Oral history interview with Severo Ornstein and Laura Gould

, University of Minnesota. Oral history interview by Bruce Bruemmer, 17 November 1994, Woodside, California, discussing the formation and activities of

.
A Brief History of ARPANET, mentioning OrnsteinSevero's website on the composer Leo Ornstein, his father
American computer scientists Computer systems researchers Living people American people of Russian-Jewish descent Scientists at PARC (company) MIT Lincoln Laboratory people 1930 births {{compu-scientist-stub