While employed at Atomic Energy Labs in Chalk River, future CS prof and head of the UBC Computing Centre Jim Kennedy wrote the technical manual for the Chalk River Datatron. Below are excerpts from the technical manual, which detailed programming the machine.
UBC installed the ALWAC III-E, invented by Axel Wenner-Gren, for the then-price of $80,000. It was in operation until 1961, and was replaced by an IBM 1620.
Excerpt from BRL Report - 1961;
Construction (Arithmetic unit only):
Vacuum-tubes: 132
Diodes: 5,000
Arithmetic mode: Serial
Timing: Synchronous
Operation: Sequential
Two commands at once are picked off the drum and...
Dr. Charlotte Froese, UBC Professor of Mathematics, taught the first Computer Science classes at UBC (listed as Math 207 and 208).
The IBM 7040 machine at the Computing Centre. Its predecessor at UBC was the IBM 1620 (obtained in 1961).
Source: Report of the President, 1963 - 1964
The department was established in May 1968 by six founding UBC faculty members. Recognized internationally for excellence in research and teaching with a conscious focus on interdisciplinary programs, the Department encourages diversity both within its community and areas of study. It plays a leadership role in research, teaching and outreach activities to champion the understanding and integration of Computer Science...
Wilfred J. Hansen wrote one of the founding texts on data structures, "Data Structures" and "Data Structures in Pascal".
Edward Argyle also worked at the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Lab in Penticton, and published widely on computer science and astrophysics.
Hugh Dempster, founding Computer Science professor.
After more than a decade working with Atomic Energy of Canada, Dr. Kennedy joined UBC in January 1966 as the Director of the Computing Centre, a position he held until June 1980. The Computing Centre served computing needs across the university, including Computer Science. In addition, he became a professor in the Department of Computer Science in 1968. From 1980...
John E. L. Peck was the first permanent Head of Department of Computer Science at the University of British Columbia.[1] He remained the Head of Department from 1969 to 1977.
Prof. Peck was one of the editors of the original Report on the Algorithmic Language ALGOL 68 and a contributing editor to the Revised Report on the Algorithmic Language ALGOL...
John R. H. Dempster published Algorithms and Programming Part 1, the lecture notes for the 1973-74 offering of CPSC 210.
Keypunch room and card reader at the Computing Centre in 1973, used for computing at UBC, including CS.
The CS Department circa 1975.
Paul Gilmore was recognized with the IBM CAS - Canadian Pioneers In Computing award by the IBM Centre for Advanced Studies as a distinguished academic who was instrumental in founding and developing the study of computing at Canadian Universities.
Serial circuit board used in the TI-990/10 minicomputer during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Broken circuits could be fixed by soldering new connections onto the board, as shown.
Lecture notes for the 1980 term 1 offering of CPSC 312 (Symbolic Computing), written by Raymond Reiter and Alan Mackworth.
Our mascot in 1981, symbolic of the late nights CS students spent programming on campus.
Life in CS in 1982; excerpts from the 1982 CS yearbook
Carlin Chao, future CS Tech Staff and Lecturer, during her undergrad studies at UBC in 1981.
John Peck teaching a CS class in 1982
Presenting an honourary degree to Erich Vogt, physicist.
Hugh Dempster teaching a class in LSK in 1983
John Hogg, guest lecturer for CPSC 407, in 1983
Donald Acton, future CS Instructor, during his grad studies at UBC in 1983
CS Department Staff in 1983
Akira Kanda teaches a CS class in 1983
Alan Mackworth in 1983
George Tsiknis, future CS Instructor, during his grad studies at UBC in 1983
Guenther Schrack, EE Associate Professor and Associate Member of CS, in 1983
Harvey Abramson teaching a CS class in 1983
Jim Little, future CS Professor, during his grad studies at UBC in 1984
Vincent Manis, CS Instructor, and Jim Varah, CS Professor, hold a discussion in 1984
Karl Abrahamson teaches a CS class in 1984
Michael Kuttner in 1984
Paul Voda teaching a CS class in 1984
Alvin Fowler, the Associate Director of Computing Centre and a CS Lecturer, teaching a CS class in 1984.
Ray Reiter in 1984
Richard Rosenberg teaching a CS class in 1984
Robert Woodham in his office in 1984
Samuel Chanson teaching a CS class in 1984
Son Vuong in 1984
HUri Ascher, CS Associate Professor and future Acting Department Head, in 1984. He taught CPSC 406 and 402.
Life in CS in 1984; excerpts from the 1984 CS yearbook
Jim Varah was recognized with the IBM CAS - Canadian Pioneers In Computing award by the IBM Centre for Advanced Studies as a distinguished academic who was instrumental in founding and developing the study of computing at Canadian Universities.
The ImageWriter dot matrix printer was introduced in 1984, and it was used at UBC during the mid- to late 1980s. Designed specifically to complement Apple's new Macintosh computer, it contained custom Apple-made firmware that worked with the Macintosh to allow WYSIWYG-like graphical printing capabilities, which couldn’t be found in other printers at the time. (Source: www.macworld.com/article/11448…)
John Demco during his grad studies in 1985.
Life in CS in 1985: Memory Map yearbook
An example of networking in the mid-1980s. To connect two computers, the white transceiver cable would connect computer A's ethernet port to the transceiver (the black box). From there, the yellow Ethernet over Coax cable would link it to another transceiver, which would be hooked up to computer B. A series of indentations at regular intervals along the coax cable...
Raymond Ng, future UBC CS Prof and Acting Department Head, in his last year of a BSc. undergrad at UBC.
Line driver used in the UBC Computing Centre. These served as signal converters between the RS-232 (computer) and RS-422 (telephone) standards, to enable serial communication between the mainframe and its terminals.
1986 CS Yearbook Excerpts
Life in CS in 1987; excerpts from the 1987 CS yearbook
Uri Ascher appointed Acting Department Head.
Canada’s identity on the internet was secured 25 years ago by the visionary work of John Demco, then Computing Facilities manager in the Department of Computer Science. Demco established the .CA domain name in 1987 – two years before the World Wide Web even emerged. Working with a team of fellow volunteers, he maintained the .CA registry until 2000, registering...
Memory board used in the Motorola 88K family of CPUs. These dual-sided boards had a capacity of 8MB of memory per side, and were stacked on top of other memory, ethernet, and processor boards to build "out of the box" computer systems.
Life in CS in 1988; excerpts from the 1988 CS yearbook
The Apple Macintosh SE/30 was used at UBC during the early 1990s. It had a CPU speed of 16MHz, a 256-byte cache each for instructions and data, and a 40 to 80MB hard drive. Although it had no on-board RAM, it had 8 RAM slots, for a maximum size of 32MB. The machine sold for $4,369. (Source: apple-history.com/se30)
Life in CS in 1989; excerpts from the 1989 CS yearbook
Alain Fournier in his office in 1989. This term, he taught CPSC 414 and 514.
Alan Ballard teaching a CS course in 1989. He taught the new Computer Architectures course, CPSC 318, and CPSC 213 (Computer Organization -- 68000 assembly language). He also worked for the Computing Centre's Academic Operating Systems Group.
Alan Mackworth in his office in 1989.
Richard Anstee, UBC Math Professor and Associate Member of the CS Department, teaching a math class to CS students in 1989.
Samuel Chanson in his office in 1989. He taught CPSC 415 (Advanced Operating Systems).
Uri Ascher in his office in 1989. He taught CPSC 320, 403, and 510.
Carlin Chao in her office in 1989. She taught CPSC 114.
Moyra Ditchfield (later became Director of Facilities) in 1989. She taught CPSC 116 (Principles of Computer Programming 2).
Hugh Dempster in his office in 1989. He taught CPSC 310 (Program Design) and CPSC 405 (Modelling and Simulation), and was also an undergrad advisor. Years later, a building was named after him where computer science lectures are still taught today.
Paul Gilmore in his office in 1989. He taught CPSC 220 (Algorithms).
Murray Goldberg in 1989. He taught CPSC 315.
Bruce Joliffe in 1989. He worked full time for the Computing Centre providing software and consulting support for microcomputers. He taught CPSC 315.
Jeff Joyce in 1989. He taught CPSC 310 and CPSC 538.
David Kirkpatrick in his office in 1989. He taught CPSC 536 (a graduate course in computational geometry).
Jim Little in his office in 1990. This year, he taught CPSC 505, CPSC 114, and CPSC 116.
David Lowe in 1990.
Rick McGeer in 1990. He taught CPSC 311.
Vince Manis in 1990. He taught CPSC 210, 213, and 310.
Gerald Neufeld in 1990. He taught CPSC 416 (Distributed Systems).
David Poole in his office in 1990. He taught CPSC 312 (Symbolic Computing) and CPSC 422 (Artificial Intelligence).
Nicholas Pippenger in 1990. He taught CPSC 501 and CPSC 506.
Richard Rosenberg in his office in 1990. This year, he taught CPSC 430 (Computers and Society).
Jim Varah in 1990. This year, he taught CPSC 402.
Son Vuong in 1990. This year, he taught CPSC 417 (Computer Communications).
Alan Wagner in 1990. This year, he taught CPSC 406 (Optimization Algorithms) and CPSC 421 (Theory of Computing).
Jame Kennedy in his office in 1990. This year, he taught CPSC 116 and CPSC 118, and was also an undergrad advisor.
Robert Woodham in his office in 1990. This year, he taught CPSC 512.
CS staff members in 1990
Life in CS in 1990; excerpts from the CS 1990 yearbook
Tape reels used in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The blue reel holds version 7 of the XINU operating system, which was used at UBC in the late 1980s. The software on the tape was run on two Sun 3 workstations. Each pair of machines had to be connected to the local network. One of the machines served as...
Life in CS in 1991; excerpts from the CS 1991 yearbook
A motherboard from the early 1990s.
Excerpts from the 1991 CS Annual Report
1991 staff workgroup.
The admin staff in the early 1990s.
Glen Lee (current tech-staff member) sits in front of an Apple SE
Excerpts from the 1992 CS Annual Report
1993 Open House
The first-year computer lab in 1993, containing 35 NeXT computers.
Life in CS in 1993; excerpts from the CS 1993 yearbook
Excerpts from the CS 1993 Annual Report
John Demco in 1994.
In 1994 the department recognized that understanding and using basic computer applications was becoming very important for a large number of students in a Science, Engineering, Commerce and other Faculties, but no appropriate tutorials on these subjects were available. In response to that need, two of our faculty members (Ian Cavers and George Tsiknis) designed a series of interactive, self-paced...
WebCT grew out of UBC research which began in 1995 when Murray Goldberg received a TLEF grant to study the effectiveness of web-based learning. The study showed that web-based learning was roughly equal in effectiveness to lecture-based learning, and that the combination of lecture and web outperformed either web or lecture-based alone. The process of building that first course was...
Life in CS in 1995; excerpts from the CS 1995 yearbook
Giao Huynh graduates as a CS major from UBC in 1995.
Excerpts from the 1995 annual report.
Robert J. Woodham Appointed Department Head.
1996 UBC CS Open House
1997 Open House
Life in CS in 1997; excerpts from the CS 1997 yearbook
Uri Ascher in 1998.
Patrice Belleville in 1998.
Kellogg Booth in 1998.
Ian Cavers, CS Instructor and future Associate Dean of Science, in 1998.
Getting ready for finals!
Intel Pentium microprocessors from the late 1990s, and their internal layouts.
Cristina Conati in 1998.
Anne Condon, future CS Department Head, in 1998
Michael Feeley in 1998.
Alain Fournier in 1998.
Paul GIlmore in 1998.
Murray Goldberg in 1998.
Mark Greenstreet in 1998.
An Intel Pentium motherboard from the late 1990s.
Alan Hu in 1998.
Norman Hutchinson in 1998.
Gregor Kiczales in 1998.
David Kirkpatrick in 1998.
Maria Klawe in 1998.
Anne Lavergne in 1998.
Jim Little in 1998.
David Lowe in 1998.
Alan Mackworth in 1998.
Gail Murphy in 1998.
Raymond Ng, future Acting Department Head, in 1998.
Dinesh Pai in 1998.
Nicholas Pippenger in 1998.
David Poole in 1999.
Richard Rosenberg in 1999.
Jack Snoeynik in 1999.
George Tsiknis in 1999.
Jim Varah in 1999.
Kay Wiese in 1999.
Life in CS in 1999; excerpts from the CS 1999 yearbook
Robert Woodham in 1999.
Anthony Winstanley graduates as a CS major from UBC in 1999.
Alan Wagner in 1999
Son Vuong in 2000.
These laptops were used at UBC during the early 2000s. The G3 Series had two drive bays, either of which could hold a battery or a wide array of 3.5" expansion devices, such as floppy or zip modules. The right drive bay could also accommodate larger 5.25" devices. (Source: apple-history.com/pg3s)
Excerpts from the CS 2000 Annual Report
Alan Mackworth appointed Acting Department Head.
Life in CS in 2001; excepts from the 2001 yearbook
2002 Open House
The Laboratory for Computational Intelligence hosts an open house in 2002.
Nando de Freitas, Kang Kang Yin, and Laks Lakshmanan at LCI's 2002 Open House
The Computer Science Department celebrates Chinese New Year.
Jim Varah, a Head of Computer Science, was also the first Director of ICICS, in 1993.
Life in CS in 2003; excerpts from the CS 2003 yearbook
Richard Rosenberg was recognized with the IBM CAS - Canadian Pioneers In Computing award by the IBM Centre for Advanced Studies as a distinguished academic who was instrumental in founding and developing the study of computing at Canadian Universities.
Life in CS in 2004; excerpts from the CS 2004 yearbook
Bill Aiello holds a PhD in applied mathematics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and comes to UBC from AT&T Research Labs in New Jersey, where he was the Director of Network Security Research.
First day of Classes in the new Hugh Dempster Pavilion. The Pavilion is named after Hugh Dempster, a former computer science professor, who was renowned for his compassion for undergraduates and was one of the original four faculty members to join the Department in 1968. He retired in 1993 and worked tirelessly with the Anglican Church on social justice issues...
UW CSE Ph.D. alumna and UBC Computer Science professor Gail Murphy was honored with the first annual Dahl-Nygaard Prize (in 2005), named for Ole-Johan Dahl and Kristen Nygaard, whose foundational work on object-oriented programming, made concrete in the Simula language, and was one of the most important inventions in software engineering.
In honoring Murphy, the selection committee wrote “Gail Murphy...
Life in CS in 2005; excerpts from the CS 2005 yearbook
Meghan Allen during her grad studies in 2005.
ICICS X-Wing Opens
Life in CS in 2006; excerpts from the CS 2006 yearbook
Felicity Foxx Herst, BCS '09, is a game designer with Silicon Sisters Interactive in Vancouver. She describes herself as an “avid and passionate female gamer.” (see Herst's Alumni Profile)
CS department staff in 2009
The Governor General’s Academic Medals recognize the outstanding scholastic achievements of students in Canada. They are awarded to the student graduating with the highest average from a high school, as well as from approved college or university programs. Pierre Trudeau, Tommy Douglas, Kim Campbell, Robert Bourassa, Robert Stanfield and Gabrielle Roy are just some of the more than 50 000...
Life in CS in 2010; excerpts from the CS 2006 yearbook
Gail Murphy and Raymond Ng appointed Department Co-Heads
Founded by Jeff Blake, UBC Business and Computer Science student and Michael Moll, full time UBC Commerce Student at the Sauder School of Business. Goodnights was UBC’s nominee for the annual Berkeley Mobile International Collaborative. BMIC flew the Goodnights team to Barcelona a few weeks ago to pitch to top investors at the World Mobile Congress where they won 1st...
Anne Condon appointed Department Head.
Sun Microsystems's SPOT (Small Programmable Object Technology) next to a wireless sensor network mote from Crossbow. The SPOT contains a Java Virtual Machine, runs at 180 MHz, has 512K of RAM and 4 megabyes of flash. On board, the SPOT has 8 tri-coloured LEDs, 2 push button switches, a light sensor, accelerometers, a temperature sensor, and pins to connect other...
UBC Computer Science Professor Anne Condon concluded her term as Department Head on June 28, 2015 by leading a team of 28 faculty, alumni, staff, and students to participate in the Scotiabank Charity Challenge, as part of the Scotiabank Half Marathon and 5K run. The team raised a total of $11, 286 to fund programs aiming at increasing diversity and...
The UBC Office of the Vice-President, Students annually recognizes exceptional contributions and significant improvements to the UBC student experience and learning environment. For 2016, they selected UBC Computer Science’s tri-mentoring program to receive the Helen McCrae Award.
The core MDS program was launched in 2016. It is a joint collaboration between the Department of Computer Science and the Department of Statistics.
Professor Margo Seltzer joined the CS department as the Canada 150 Research Chair in Computer Systems and the Cheriton Family Chair in Computer Science in September 2018, a position that came with $1 million in federal funding per year for seven years.