David Neil Cutler, Sr. (born March 13, 1942) is a noted American software engineer, designer and developer of several operating systems including the RSX-11, VMS and VAXELN systems of Digital Equipment Corporation and Windows NT from Microsoft. is the 72nd day of the year (73rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1942 (MCMXLII) was a common year starting on Thursday (the link will display the full 1942 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Location in Ingham County, Michigan1 Coordinates: Country United States State Michigan County Ingham, Eaton Settled 1835 Incorporation 1859 Government  - Type Strong Mayor-Council  - Mayor Virg Bernero (D) Area  - City  35. ... is the 72nd day of the year (73rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1942 (MCMXLII) was a common year starting on Thursday (the link will display the full 1942 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Software engineering (SE) is the profession concerned with specifying, designing, developing and maintaining software applications by applying technologies and practices from computer science, project management, and other fields. ... An operating system (OS) is a software that manages computer resources and provides programmers with an interface used to access those resources. ... RSX-11 is a family of real-time operating systems mainly for PDP-11 computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), common in the late 1970s and early 1980s. ... OpenVMS[1] (Open Virtual Memory System or just VMS) is the name of a high-end computer server operating system that runs on the VAX[2] and Alpha[3] family of computers developed by Digital Equipment Corporation of Maynard, Massachusetts (DIGITAL was then purchased by Compaq, and is now owned... VAXeln is a real-time operating system for MicroVAX. Trivia It was originally supposed to be named ELAN but DEC discovered at the last minute that it was trademarked in a European country where DEC wished to conduct business. ... Digital Equipment Corporation was a pioneering American company in the computer industry. ... Windows NT (New Technology) is a family of operating systems produced by Microsoft, the first version of which was released in July 1993. ... Microsoft Corporation, (NASDAQ: MSFT, HKSE: 4338) is a multinational computer technology corporation with global annual revenue of US$44. ...

Personal history

David Neil Cutler, Sr. was born in Lansing, Michigan and grew up in DeWitt, Michigan. After graduating from Olivet College in 1965, Cutler went to work for DuPont. One of his tasks was developing and running computer simulations on Digital machines. He developed an interest in operating systems and left DuPont to pursue that interest. Location in Ingham County, Michigan1 Coordinates: Country United States State Michigan County Ingham, Eaton Settled 1835 Incorporation 1859 Government  - Type Strong Mayor-Council  - Mayor Virg Bernero (D) Area  - City  35. ... DeWitt is a city in Clinton County in the U.S. state of Michigan. ... Olivet College is a coeducational, Christian, liberal arts college located in Olivet, Michigan, 30 miles south of Lansing and 125 miles west of Detroit. ... Year 1965 (MCMLXV) was a common year starting on Friday (link will display full calendar) of the 1965 Gregorian calendar. ... This article is about E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Company. ... This article is about computer modeling within a scientific medium. ...

Cutler's software career started at a small company he founded called Agrippa-Ord, located in Monument Square, Concord, Massachusetts (or possibly in Acton, Massachusetts), marketing software for the LINC and PDP-8 computers. Computer software (or simply software) refers to one or more computer programs and data held in the storage of a computer for some purpose. ... Location in Middlesex County in Massachusetts Coordinates: , Country State County Middlesex Settled 1635 Incorporated 1635 Government  - Type Open town meeting Area  - Total 25. ... Location in Middlesex County in Massachusetts Coordinates: , Country State County Middlesex Settled 1639 Incorporated 1735 Government  - Type Open Town Meeting  - Town Manager Don P. Johnson  - Board of    Selectmen Peter Berry Dore Hunter Paulina Knibbe Andy Magee Lauren Rosenzweig Area  - Total 20. ... The LINC (Laboratory Instrument Computer) was a 12-bit, 2048-word computer. ... A PDP-8 on display at the Smithsonians National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C.. This example is from the first generation of PDP-8s, built with discrete transistors and later known as the Straight 8. ...

Cutler holds over 20 patents and is an affiliate professor in the Computer Science Department at the University of Washington. The University of Washington, founded in 1861, is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. ...

David Cutler usefully summarised his own career in the foreword ^[1] to Inside Windows NT.

In addition to his engineering skills, Cutler is known for his sardonic humor. He generally referred to the RSX fork list as the "fork queue" ^[2] Sometimes even his error messages turn out to have a double meaning. RSX-11 is a family of real-time operating systems mainly for PDP-11 computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), common in the late 1970s and early 1980s. ...

David is also an avid auto racing driver. He has previously competed in the Atlantic Championship from 1996 to 2002, scoring a career best of 8th on the Milwaukee Mile in 2000. Juuso Pykälistö driving a Peugeot 206 World Rally Car at the 2003 Swedish rally Racing cars redirects here. ... The Cooper Tires presents the Atlantic Championship Powered by Mazda is a formula racing series with races throughout North America. ... Year 1996 (MCMXCVI) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will display full 1996 Gregorian calendar). ... Also see: 2002 (number). ... The Milwaukee Mile (also The Mile and Americas Legendary Oval) is a race track in West Allis, Wisconsin, USA. It is a mile long (1. ... Year 2000 (MM) was a leap year starting on Saturday. ...

VMS

In April 1975, DIGITAL began a hardware project, code named Star, to design on a 32-bit virtual address extension to its PDP-11. In June 1975, Dave together with Dick Hustvedt, and Peter Lippman were appointed the technical project leaders for the software project, code-named Starlet, to develop a totally new operating system for the Star family of processors. These two projects were tightly integrated from the beginning. The three technical leaders of the Starlet project together with three technical leaders of the Star project formed the "Blue Ribbon Committee" at DIGITAL who produced the fifth design evolution for the programs. The design featured simplifications to the memory management and process scheduling schemes of the earlier proposals and the architecture was accepted. The Star and Starlet projects culminated in the development of the VAX 11/780 computer and the VAX/VMS operating system. Year 1975 (MCMLXXV) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... The PDP-11 was a 16-bit minicomputer sold by Digital Equipment Corp. ... Richard (Dick) Irvin Hustvedt (born February 18, 1946) is a renowned software engineer, designer and developer of several operating systems including the RSX-11, 782 ASMP and VMS (OpenVMS) systems of Digital Equipment Corporation. ... VAX is a 32-bit computing architecture that supports an orthogonal instruction set (machine language) and virtual addressing (i. ...

At DEC he is widely credited for terminating the 1979-80 Desktop RSTS project and scrapping the manufacturing prototype. Compared to the subsequently announced IBM-PC, RSTS had 40,000 running applications, ANSI languages, and a DBMS. RSTS had a reputation as a robust, stable and reliable multi-user, multi-tasking operating system. RSTS also had a virtual operating mode that allowed it to faithfully emulate other operating systems such as RSX-11M and RT11. But it's not fair to blame Cutler for this loss; it was Ken Olsen who refused to understand the idea of anyone wanting to have his/her own computer on the desk. RSTS/E (an acronym for Resource Sharing Timesharing System Extended) was a multi-user time-shared operating system developed by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) (now part of Hewlett Packard) for the PDP-11 series of 16-bit minicomputers, and used primarily during the 1970s and 1980s, although some installations were... The IBM PC (Personal Computer), was the original version and progenitor of the IBM PC compatible hardware platform. ... Ken Olsen calling UNIX snake oil Kenneth H. Olsen (born on February 20, 1926) is an American engineer who cofounded Digital Equipment Corporation in 1957 with colleague Harlan Anderson. ...

Prism and Mica projects

DIGITAL began working on RISC technology in 1986 and Cutler, who was then working in DEC's DECWest facility in Bellevue, Washington, was elected to head Prism, a project to develop the company’s RISC machine. Its operating system, code named Mica, would embody the next generation of design principles and have a compatibility layer for UNIX and VMS. The RISC machine was to be based on ECL technology and was one of three ECL projects DIGITAL was undertaking at the time. On the basis of the R&D cost involved in funding multiple ECL projects to yield products that would ultimately compete against each other, Prism was cancelled in 1988 in favor of a system running Ultrix on processors produced by MIPS. Of the three ECL projects, the VAX 9000 was the only one that was commercialised. Reduced Instruction Set Computer (RISC), is a microprocessor CPU design philosophy that favors a smaller and simpler set of instructions that all take about the same amount of time to execute. ... Year 1986 (MCMLXXXVI) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link displays 1986 Gregorian calendar). ... PRISM was a 32-bit RISC CPU design from Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). ... In electronics, emitter coupled logic, or ECL, is a logic family in which current is steered through bipolar transistors to compute logical functions. ... Year 1988 (MCMLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Friday (link displays 1988 Gregorian calendar). ... Ultrix (officially all-caps ULTRIX) was the brand name of Digital Equipment Corporations (DEC) native Unix systems. ... ...

Windows NT

Cutler left Digital for Microsoft in October 1988 and led the development of Windows NT. Later, he worked on targeting Windows NT to Digital's 64-bit Alpha computer (itself based on the Prism design), then on Windows 2000. After the demise of Windows on Alpha (and DEC, itself), Cutler was instrumental in porting Windows to AMD's new 64-bit AMD64 architecture. He was involved with the Windows XP Pro 64-bit and Windows Server 2003 SP1 64-bit releases, as well as Windows Vista. He moved to working on Microsoft's Live Platform in August 2006. Dave Cutler was awarded the prestigious status of Senior Technical fellow in Microsoft. Year 1988 (MCMLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Friday (link displays 1988 Gregorian calendar). ... DEC Alpha AXP 21064 Microprocessor die photo Package for DEC Alpha AXP 21064 Microprocessor Alpha AXP 21064 bare die mounted on a business card with some statistics The DEC Alpha, also known as the Alpha AXP, is a 64-bit RISC microprocessor originally developed and fabricated by Digital Equipment Corp... Windows 2000 (also referred to as Win2K) is a preemptive, interruptible, graphical and business-oriented operating system designed to work with either uniprocessor or symmetric multi-processor computers. ... AMD64 Logo AMD64 (also x86-64 or x64) is a 64-bit microprocessor architecture and corresponding instruction set designed by Advanced Micro Devices. ... Windows XP is a line of operating systems developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, notebook computers, and media centers. ... Windows Server may refer to: Windows 2000 Server, the release based on Windows 2000 Windows Server 2003, the current release of Windows Server Windows Server Longhorn, the upcoming release of Windows Server Windows Home Server, an upcoming server operating system intended for home use Microsoft Servers, a family of servers... Windows Vista (pronounced ) is a line of operating systems developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, Tablet PCs, and media centers. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Microsoft awards the title of Technical Fellow to someone whose technical vision, expertise, and world-class leadership is widely recognized. ...

Trivia

• Tomonobu Itagaki, creator of the Dead or Alive video game series, mentioned Cutler as the programmer he admires the most.[1]

• Accidentally or otherwise, the initials for Windows NT, "WNT", are a 1-step transposition of "VMS", and VMS was the DEC operating system that greatly influenced Cutler's later development of Windows NT. (Similar to "HAL" standing for "IBM" in '2001: A Space Odyssey'.)

Tomonobu Itagaki Tomonobu Itagaki is a Japanese video game designer who heads Team Ninja, one of Tecmos development teams. ... Dead or Alive ) is a video game series produced by Tecmo that comprises primarily fighting games. ... Windows NT (New Technology) is a family of operating systems produced by Microsoft, the first version of which was released in July 1993. ... OpenVMS[1] (Open Virtual Memory System or just VMS) is the name of a high-end computer server operating system that runs on the VAX[2] and Alpha[3] family of computers developed by Digital Equipment Corporation of Maynard, Massachusetts (DIGITAL was then purchased by Compaq, and is now owned... Digital Equipment Corporation was a pioneering American company in the computer industry. ... Windows NT (New Technology) is a family of operating systems produced by Microsoft, the first version of which was released in July 1993. ...

References

• Zachary, G. Pascal (1994). Showstopper! The Breakneck Race to Create Windows NT and the Next Generation at Microsoft. Warner Books. ISBN 0-02-935671-7. 

External links

• Dave Cutler video on 64 bit computing at AMD Site
• Atlantic Championship career statistics