Lynn Conway
The VLSI Revolution
Mead-Conway, and making chip design something you could teach
Rating
94Impact score
Domains
VLSI designComputer architectureDesign methodology
Scouting report
Invented dynamic instruction scheduling at IBM in the 1960s, was fired when she transitioned, and rebuilt her career from scratch. At Xerox PARC she and Carver Mead created the VLSI design methodology and the textbook that let universities teach chip design, then set up MOSIS so students could actually fabricate. Modern semiconductors are organised the way she said they should be.
Curator’s note
Did it twice, the second time after the industry threw her away.
Portrait
Painted from a photograph of Lynn Conway by Charles Rogers, licensed CC BY-SA 2.5.
Sources
- 01Lynn Conway en.wikipedia.org
- 02Introduction to VLSI Systems en.wikipedia.org