van Dam, Andy

Andy at work in his office at Brown University. September 1993
Van Dam at work in his office at Brown University in September 1993.

Andries “Andy” van Dam’s (1938 – ) work focuses on interactive media, from computer graphics to hypermedia, particularly for educational purposes. He is a leader in work on electronic books with interactive illustrations.

With Ted Nelson, Van Dam designed both HES and FRESS, the first and second hypertext systems that allowed separate pages of text to be connected via hyperlinks, such as this one.

Also a star educator in the field of computer graphics, Van Dam helped write the industry standard instructional textbook in computer graphics, Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice, with James D. Foley, Steven K. Feiner, and J. F. Hughes. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, has received the ACM SIGGRAPH Steven Anson Coons Award for Outstanding Creative Contributions to Computer Graphics in 1991 and is a member of the SIGGRAPH Academy.

Andy Van Dam (second from left) at Asana Restaurant, Boston, MA, with Ben Shneiderman (l), Aaron Marcus, and Ron Becker, celebrating Aaron’s election to the CHI Academy. April 5, 2009,
Andy Van Dam (second from left) at Asana Restaurant in Boston, MA, with Ben Shneiderman (l), Aaron Marcus, and Ron Baecker,
celebrating Aaron’s election to the CHI Academy. April 5, 2009.

 

Andries van Dam has taught a remarkable number of students who have gone on to successful careers, especially as chairs of computer science departments. He is much appreciated by his students and colleagues like me for his intensity, emotional connectedness, and professional generosity. His devotion to 3D technology and user interfaces led to the highly influential book, Fundamentals of Interactive Computer Graphics, written with James Foley in 1980, with later editions in English and other languages.  He’s also rightly proud of his five-decade-long effort on hypertext/hypermedia systems. – Ben Shneiderman

 

Van Dam at Brown University in September 1993.
Van Dam at the ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems in Boston, MA in 1994.
Van Dam at the National Science Foundation Workshop in Chateau Bonas, France in 1999.
Van Dam and Dorothy Stout at the Workshop on SMET Education at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC on June 20, 2000.

Education:

  • Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania (1966)
  • M.S., University of Pennsylvania (1963)
  • B.S. in Engineering, Swarthmore College (1960)

Affiliations:

  • Microsoft Research Technical Advisory Board (1991 – 2006)
  • Chairman, Computing Research Association (1985 – 1987)
  • Co-Founder and innaugural chair, Department of Computer Science, Brown University (1979 – 1985)
  • Co-Founder ACM SIGGRAPH (1967)
  • Faculty, Brown University (1965 – Present)

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