| Hopper, Grace Murray 1906-1992. American mathematician and computer programmer. Noted for her development of programming languages, especially COBOL, she is credited with inventing the first compiler. |
| Hopper (hŏp'ər) Pronunciation Key
American mathematician and computer programmer who in 1951 conceived the idea for an internal computer program, called a compiler, that scanned a set of alphanumeric instructions (such as words and symbols) and compiled a set of binary instructions executed by the machine. Her ideas were widely influential in the development of programming languages, in particular COBOL. |