A Conversation with Juris Hartmanis

Abstract

Juris Hartmanis is video taped in a far-reaching conversation (70 minutes) with colleague David Gries. They discuss Hartmanis’ childhood and family background and his immigration to the United States. Next they trace his extraordinary career at the GE Research Laboratory, where he collaborated with Richard Stearns on pioneering research that eventually was recognized by ACM’s prestigious, highest honor – the Turing Award. After having served earlier as an Instructor in Cornell’s Mathematics Department, Juris returned to Cornell as a full professor and the founding chair of a new department of Computer Science. This Department was embedded in two colleges, Engineering and Arts and Sciences. Cornell was among the first Universities to establish a Department of Computer Science. His pioneering work on computational complexity blossomed into a new field and under his leadership the Computer Science department matured into a robust, national leader with a strong theoretical emphasis. After a successful stint at the National Science Foundation leading the transition of the academic research network NSFnet to become the Internet, he returned to Cornell. At Cornell he continues an active program of research and maintains a leadership role in developing information technologies that have become a ubiquitous element across the entire Cornell academic scene.Juris Hartmanis joined Cornell in 1965 as the founding chair of the new Department of Computer Science. One of the first CS departments (the first started in 1964), CS was embedded in two colleges, Engineering and Arts & Sciences. Under his leadership, CS matured into a robust, national leader with a strong theoretical emphasis. Juris came from GE, where he collaborated with Richard Stearns on pioneering research that was later recognized by ACM’s prestigious, highest honor: the Turing Award. Fittingly, Juris is known as “the father of computational complexity”. He is a member of the NAE and NAS, has honorary doctorates, and received the Grand Medal of the Latvian Academy of Sciences. Like most of the CS faculty, Juris spent time in the service of the CS community. He chaired a National Research Council Study, resulting in the book “Computing the Future”. In 1996-1998, he was Assistant Director of the NSF Directorate of Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE). In this conversation (70 minutes), Juris and David talk about his childhood, his family background, his immigration to the US, and his career. Running Time: 70 min. http://hdl.handle.net/1813/149341_u9odoqp