Ben Yalow

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Ben Yalow 1979 [1] Benjamin (Ben) Yalow,

an American computer scientist, as a programmer long time affiliated with City University of New York, and Science fiction fandom [2] [3].

CCCP

In 1970/71, at Columbia University, along with Steven M. Bellovin, Andrew Koenig, and Aron Eisenpress, Ben Yalow co-authored the chess program CCCP, which competed at the ACM 1971, and was initially based on Hans Berliner’s program J. Biit, which played one year before [4] [5]. Andrew Koenig on the individual roles of CCCP’s programming team [6]:

[I](Andrew_Koenig "Andrew Koenig") designed the overall structure of the program and coded much of the [human interface](User_Interface "User Interface"). [Steve](Steven_M._Bellovin "Steven M. Bellovin") wrote the [tree searching](Search "Search") and [pruning](Pruning "Pruning") routines, Ben did the [move generation](Move_Generation "Move Generation") and [evaluation routines](Evaluation "Evaluation"), and [Aron](Aron_Eisenpress "Aron Eisenpress") wrote the part of the human interface that made it possible to [enter moves](Entering_Moves "Entering Moves") at a [2250 display](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_2250) with a [light pen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_pen) ...

From Columbia to CUNY

Quote by Gillian Frasier from Aron Eisenpress, CUNY/CIS’s Renaissance Man [7] [8]:

Kenneth King was Director of the Columbia Computer Center and [Ira Fuchs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ira_Fuchs) Manager of Systems Programming. These two got to know [Eisenpress](Aron_Eisenpress "Aron Eisenpress") and had the foresight to encourage his curiosity. He was hired part-time to train the operators and then full-time as a systems programmer in 1971.
In 1973, King was hired by the [City University of New York](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_University_of_New_York) as Dean of Computing, with the specific mandate to create the new central CUNY computer center at 57th Street. He brought with him many of his Columbia staff - Eisenpress, Ben Yalow, Ira Fuchs, ... who made up the initial core of the CUNY/UCC systems group. 

References

  1. Ben Yalow 1979 | Flickr - Photosharing! by Morbius19
  2. Ben Yalow’s homepage
  3. Ben Yalow « File 770
  4. Computing at Columbia Timeline - Aug 3-5, 1971
  5. Recollections of CUCC 1968-70 -The CCCP Chess Program
  6. Andrew Koenig (1978). Light-Pen used in game. Personal Computing, Vol. 2, No. 5, pp. 112
  7. Aron Eisenpress, CUNY/CIS’s Renaissance Man by Gillian Frasier
  8. Computing at Columbia Timeline - May 1973

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