[Ads-l] Grace Murray Hopper Honored by Yale

Sun Feb 12 23:31:46 UTC 2017

Actually, I see that the 1944 "debugging" citation is found in Wikipedia.  I have posted a 1941 citation on ADS-L.  But Kidwell has the earliest known citations for the relevant sense of "bug."

Fred Shapiro

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From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU>
Sent: Sunday, February 12, 2017 6:28 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: Grace Murray Hopper Honored by Yale

I was the first to really question the Hopper/moth myth, in several articles beginning in the 1980s.  The definitive citations are given by Peggy Kidwell in an article in the IEEE Annals of the History of Computing.  I believe she traced "debugging" back to 1944.

Fred Shapiro

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From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of James A. Landau <JJJRLandau at NETSCAPE.COM>
Sent: Sunday, February 12, 2017 6:16 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: Grace Murray Hopper Honored by Yale

On Sun, 12 Feb 2017 03:40:52 Zone + 0000 "Shapiro, Fred" <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU> wrote:

<quote>

<snip>  But I am curious whether Hopper's principal claim to popular fame, the colorful but wholly erroneous claim that she coined the term "bug" for defects in computer hardware or software, will be repeated by the media or Yale in connection with the naming.

</quote>

The log entry (see https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.wired.com_2013_12_googles-2Ddoodle-2Dhonors-2Dgrace-2Dhopper-2Dand-2Dentomology_&d=CwIGaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=NvsW-OhBbzxE92nK31T2wnmV21_Bx7bPCKzIsk5T4FQ&m=hyxZT5RC9uRyTcJTjcZdt0eZnwydk9AhUkflybrd_E8&s=ZZShkZv4cSEiZhOpWfRHxmdAzhMU02QRkDSyhSzS4Xw&e= )
[https://www.wired.com/wp-content/uploads/images_blogs/wiredscience/2013/12/grace-hoppers-107th-birthday-5447077240766464.4-hp.gif]<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.wired.com_2013_12_googles-2Ddoodle-2Dhonors-2Dgrace-2Dhopper-2Dand-2Dentomology_&d=CwIGaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=NvsW-OhBbzxE92nK31T2wnmV21_Bx7bPCKzIsk5T4FQ&m=hyxZT5RC9uRyTcJTjcZdt0eZnwydk9AhUkflybrd_E8&s=ZZShkZv4cSEiZhOpWfRHxmdAzhMU02QRkDSyhSzS4Xw&e=>

Google Honors Grace Hopper…and a “bug”<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.wired.com_2013_12_googles-2Ddoodle-2Dhonors-2Dgrace-2Dhopper-2Dand-2Dentomology_&d=CwIGaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=NvsW-OhBbzxE92nK31T2wnmV21_Bx7bPCKzIsk5T4FQ&m=hyxZT5RC9uRyTcJTjcZdt0eZnwydk9AhUkflybrd_E8&s=ZZShkZv4cSEiZhOpWfRHxmdAzhMU02QRkDSyhSzS4Xw&e=>
urldefense.proofpoint.com
The December 9th, 2013 Google Doodle Honors Grace Hopper's 107th Birthday...and has an entomological surprise at the end!

[https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.wired.com_wp-2Dcontent_uploads_images-5Fblogs_wiredscience_2013_12_grace-2Dhoppers-2D107th-2Dbirthday-2D5447077240766464.4-2Dhp.gif&d=CwIF-g&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=NvsW-OhBbzxE92nK31T2wnmV21_Bx7bPCKzIsk5T4FQ&m=1e1dhnjM3Z-E4KBzoMyXVgYooB2Ejz_wgOBYECQFhYI&s=AwTF0jWGgQInzRihNka0I3Rb5lQTL0C7Tn-Hd_93TPM&e= ]<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.wired.com_2013_12_googles-2Ddoodle-2Dhonors-2Dgrace-2Dhopper-2Dand-2Dentomology_&d=CwIGaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=NvsW-OhBbzxE92nK31T2wnmV21_Bx7bPCKzIsk5T4FQ&m=hyxZT5RC9uRyTcJTjcZdt0eZnwydk9AhUkflybrd_E8&s=ZZShkZv4cSEiZhOpWfRHxmdAzhMU02QRkDSyhSzS4Xw&e=>

Google Honors Grace Hopper…and a “bug”<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.wired.com_2013_12_googles-2Ddoodle-2Dhonors-2Dgrace-2Dhopper-2Dand-2Dentomology_&d=CwIGaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=NvsW-OhBbzxE92nK31T2wnmV21_Bx7bPCKzIsk5T4FQ&m=hyxZT5RC9uRyTcJTjcZdt0eZnwydk9AhUkflybrd_E8&s=ZZShkZv4cSEiZhOpWfRHxmdAzhMU02QRkDSyhSzS4Xw&e=>
urldefense.proofpoint.com
The December 9th, 2013 Google Doodle Honors Grace Hopper's 107th Birthday...and has an entomological surprise at the end!

reads “First actual case of bug being found”.

This strongly implies (if not proves) that the term "bug" for a technical problem was already in existence and widely known, and that this was the first actual case of a actual biological bug (in this case a moth) causing such a bug.

The above-quoted website also suggests that the term "debugging" was invented around this time, if not by Dr. Hopper.  Anyone have data?

- Jim Landau

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