Well deserved and absolutely couldn't happen to a nicer guy. After giving a talk at PLDI when I was a grad student, Simon made a point of walking up to me and saying "Nice talk." That had me walking on air for quite a while (if you watch the videos below, you will understand why).<p>Now, Simon got the award for his (fantastic) research and for his impact on CS education in the UK, but everyone in all of computer science should set aside a couple of hours this weekend to watch his talks on "How to Give a Good Research Talk" and "How to Write a Great Research Paper." Go ahead, I'll wait.<p><a href="http://research.microsoft.com/apps/video/default.aspx?id=168648" rel="nofollow">http://research.microsoft.com/apps/video/default.aspx?id=168...</a><p><a href="http://research.microsoft.com/apps/video/default.aspx?id=168649" rel="nofollow">http://research.microsoft.com/apps/video/default.aspx?id=168...</a><p>Also, Simon's home page is here:
<a href="http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/people/simonpj/" rel="nofollow">http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/people/simonpj/</a>
Simon Peyton Jones is the mister Rogers of computer science. He is an incredible role model for how to treat others while managing to be balance being clear, benign, and constructive. (I've been a recipient of such feedback a time or three, and It was incredibly helpful for me each time. ) well deserved!
I recently read his (first) paper [1] on the Spineless Tagless Graph Redunction Machine (STG), which forms one of the lower-level backends of the main Haskell compiler GHC.<p>After understanding the paper well enough to implement it from scratch (without any further literature), I have to say, albeit some 25 years late, how impressed I am by both his research and his ability to convey it. If you're interested in understanding how Haskell evaluation is done, I cannot recommend the paper enough.<p>[1]: <a href="http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=67083" rel="nofollow">http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=6708...</a>
I met him once back then I didn't know who he was. Weirdly I was reading the book: <a href="http://www.codersatwork.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.codersatwork.com/</a> at the time - ofcourse I got a shock when I realised he was the next chapter!<p>Anyway he was a nice guy.
I'm happy and honored every day that a nobody like me gets to work with Simon, and talk to him regularly.<p>His work on Computing at School, in particular his ICFP 2013 keynote, continues to be incredibly inspiring to me. Aside from his wonderful technical prowess.
That guy is awesome.<p>I went to a conference in Portugal a number of years ago, and met him at the dinner for the speakers. He was super humble, and quite interested in my own very practical experience as a consultant/contractor and what kinds of problems I faced.<p>I came away deeply impressed not only by how bright he is, but what a good person too.