Hey! Notice US!
Linux-cult alert.
Looks like a cheap shot at Jobs, to me.
Dennis Ritchie was a pioneer. His work is well known to techies, but Ritchie was first and foremost a techie. Jobs was a visionary, and idea man. Comparing the two is like comparing George Stienbrenner to Derek Jeter. Same business, different jobs. (Pun not intended).
Steve Jobs was remarkable, and would have done something remarkable, regardless of the environment.
Dennis Ritchie was remarkable, and would have done something amazing, even if Bell Labs didn’t exist.
The author of this article should be ashamed.
This situation is not unique. Howard Hughes dropped out of college, as well. Both men had the aptitude to have more than a pedestrian knowledge of their fields. More importantly, they had the vision and resources to find, hire, and retain the best talent available. Hughes and Jobs changed aerospace and computing, though both fields were established prior to their involvement.
The loss of Jobs and Ritchie is akin to the loss of Ford and Barnett: the latter set the groundwork technology, the former turned it into a culture-changing product.
Hmmmm,nothing at all said about electronics which store gigabytes on a surface almost too small to see, transistors which switch at nanosecond rates, batteries that last for years and run for hours.
Sure glad I didn’t study any of that old electrical engineering stuff.
All the systems described would work in other programming languages (albeit perhaps less efficiently).
But none would work at all without the exploitation of quantum physics provided by the transistor, along with the associated improvements in just plain electronics.
I don’t think it’s necessary to compare the two men, both have unquestionably made big contributions and are worthy of respect. I had an early interaction with Steve Jobs in the Apple II era (and have the business card to prove it), in which he was arrogant and rude, but that doesn’t negate whhat he accomplished.
For the record, the history of Apple must also acknowledge the impact Alan Kay, a researcher at Xerox PARC had on the Mac, and also on Windows. He created the first GUI and mouse (as demonstrated by the Xeror Alto and Star), and PARC worked with Jobs and Apple to incorporate these elements into the initial Macintosh. Most every innovator will admit that he stood on the shoulders of giants, and Alan Kay is one of them: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Kay
There were other visionaries around at the same time, but the visions of Ritchie and Jobs were "correct," meaning they were the right thing at the right time.
Ritchie did an extremely good job of looking at the other programming languages of his time, drilling down deep to figure out what was wrong about them and what was right about them, and then keeping the best parts of what worked while addressing their shortcomings and fixing what didn't work. In my opinion, C is a very good language, although not hugely better than others that were around in those days (I'm thinking of Pascal, but others will differ on that). The great value of C, as far as I'm concerned, is that it led to C++, which represents a true paradigm-shift for the art of computer programming. As many of you know, C++ was not the first object-oriented language, but it is (again in my opinion) the most accessable.
Jobs, on the other hand, visualized what a small computer could be, and saw a path to the realization of that vision. He had help, of course. Many have talked about his two-day visit to Xerox PARC, at which he was introduced to the GUI and the concepts that surround it, as well as the Ethernet. Jobs didn't figure out those ideas, it's true. He did, however, figure out how to bring them to market in a way that would make money, and he did it first, before Microsoft. If the great minds at Xerox could have done that, the Mac freaks would be Lisa freaks, and many other things in our world today would have different names.
Both were techies, and both were engineers. One was self-taught, and the other went "the high road" through some of the best academic experiences one can have.
Both were driven by a desire to pursue a vision to the end, and, because they were first to market, will be remembered for a long time.