Thursday, March 30, 2006 Volen 101, 2:00-3.00 pm
Abstract:
Where's My Compiler?
In the fifty years since the first compilers were written, the "tool chain" used by programmers to create and execute programs has
changed dramatically. In this talk we'll examine how these changes have impacted the design of compilers. With this background, we'll
go on to explore the wide range of places where compiler technology is in use -- from applications to operating systems to hardware to
data bases.
Bio:
Jim Miller is a senior architect on Microsoft's Common Language Runtime (CLR) team. His current work is on architectural changes to
allow innovation in the core of the CLR and the managed Frameworks while preserving backward compatibility. He also serves as liaison
with the academic, research, and compiler communities for the CLR team.
Jim holds a PhD in Computer Science from MIT and served on the faculty at Brandeis University as well as on the research staff at MIT.
He has been on the research staff at Digital Equipment Corporation and the Open Software Foundation. Before joining Microsoft, he was
on the senior management team of the World Wide Web Consortium, reporting to Tim Berners-Lee and in charge of work on security,
electronic commerce, child protection, privacy protection, accessibility, and intellectual property protection.
Jim joined Microsoft in 1998, leading the program management team for the kernel of the .NET Common Language Runtime (CLR). His
responsibility included garbage collection, metadata definition and file formats, intermediate language (IL) definition, IL-to-native
code compilation, and remote objects. He also serves as editor for ECMA TC39/TG3, which is charged with creating an international
standard for a Common Language Infrastructure. To validate this standard, Jim helped create the Shared Source CLI (also known as
Rotor), a complete implementation of the standard, runnable on Windows, Macintosh, and Unix operating systems, available in source form
for teaching and non-commercial purposes.
Host: Tim Hickey