Herman Lukoff

Herman Lukoff ( born May 2, 1923 in Philadelphia, † 24 September 1979) was an American computer pioneer.

Lukoff studied electrical engineering at the Moore School of the University of Pennsylvania with a bachelor's degree in 1943. Already during his studies and after graduation, he worked on the ENIAC project of J. Presper Eckert and John W. Mauchly, what is considered by the military service in the U.S. Navy radio technician was interrupted. From 1946 he was at the Moore School again, where he at Eckert and Mauchly EDVAC computer worked on ( electronic control for acoustic mercury delay lines, which served as a storage ). He also joined, founded by Eckert and Mauchly Computer Company, which was acquired in 1950 by Remington Rand. Here he was much involved in the development of input and output devices for the UNIVAC I ( control electronics for the magnetic tape devices). In 1955, he was the successor company for the development of the Sperry Rand UNIVAC LARC ( Livermore Automatic Research Computer ) responsible, which was completed in 1961 and had a semiconductor processor. In 1960 he became head of the development department of Sperry Rand. He led the development of the UNIVAC III, the UNIVAC 1050, the fast edge I mass memory, the Uniservo III C magnetic tape system and the magnetic core memory technology, which led to that was Sperry Rand one of the largest manufacturers in this sector.

In 1969 he received the W. Wallace McDowell Award and the 1981 Computer Pioneer Award.

In 1979, he died of leukemia. In the same year he published his autobiography (From Dits to Bits: . A personal history of the electronic computer, Robotics Press, Forest Grove, Oregon ISBN 0-89661-002-0 ). Lukoff was married since 1948 and had three sons and a daughter. His grave is located in Shalom Memorial Park, Philadelphia.