Sandy Douglas: Difference between revisions

|known_for = [[OXO (video game)|OXO]]

'''Alexander Shafto''' "'''Sandy'''" '''Douglas''' [[Commander of the Order of the British Empire|CBE]] (21 May 1921 – 29 April 2010) was a British professor of [[computer science]], credited with creating the first graphical computer game, [[OXO]] (also known as ''Noughts andvideo Crosses''game)|OXO]], a version of [[tic-tac-toe]]noughts computerand gamecrosses]], in 1952 on the [[EDSAC]] computer at [[University of Cambridge]].<ref>{{cite book | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=E4-pXc-IEtsC&pg=PA538 | title = Battleground: the media | page = 538 |author1=Andersen, Robin |author2=Gray, Jonathan Alan | publisher = Greenwood Publishing Group | year = 2008 | ISBN = 978-0-313-34169-4 }}</ref><ref>[http://www.pong-story.com/1952.htm A.S.Douglas' 1952 Noughts and Crosses game], [http://www.pong-story.com/ Pong Story].</ref>

Douglas was born on 21 May 1921 in [[London]]. At age eight, his family moved to [[Cromwell Road]], near what would become the London Air Terminal.

A 74 bus ride for one old penny took me to Exhibition Road, from which I could go towards South Kensington station to my father's office (which is still there) and workshop (now demolished) down by what became the ElyséeLycée FrançaiseFrançais. Alternatively, I could turn north to the Science Museum – a trip I took often.

During the [[London Blitz|Blitz]], in 1940–41, Douglas's [[Home Guard (United Kingdom)|Home Guard]] Unit, 'C' Company of the [[Chelsea and Kensington Battalion]] of the KRRC, had its headquarters in the basement of the [[Royal School of Mines]], just the other side of [[Exhibition Road]] from the museums. He commissionedappeared to commission into the [[Corps of Royal Engineers]] on 7 March 1943 as a [[second lieutenant]].,<ref>{{London Gazette|issue=36112|supp=y|page=3432|date=30 July1943July 1943}}</ref> but this was later corrected to show that he actually commissioned into the [[Royal Corps of Signals]].<ref>{{London Gazette|issue=36177|supp=y|page=4173|date=17 September 1943}}</ref>

Douglas attended the [[University of Cambridge]] in 1950. In 1952, while working towards earning his PhD, he wrote a [[thesis]] which focused on [[human-computer interaction]]s and he needed an example to prove his theories. At that time, Cambridge was home to the second only [[stored-program computer]], the [[EDSAC]] or Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (the first being [[Manchester University]]'s "[[SmallManchester Scale Experimental MachineBaby|Baby]]" or SSEM, nicknamed "The Baby", which ran its first program on 21 June 1948). This gave Douglas the perfect opportunity to prove his findings by programming the code for a simple game where a player can compete against the computer –, [[OXO (video game)|OXO]].

In June 1960 the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals set up a Working Party to explore the creation of a national system for handling university admissions. Douglas was appointed a member of the Working Party to provide advice on the use of computers in this system. He had previously worked at Leeds with [[Leslie Ronald Kay|Ronald Kay]], who was to become [[Universities Central Council on Admissions|UCCA]]'s general secretary, on "an early and primitive but successful attempt to introduce computer methods into student registration procedures".<ref>{{cite book

* Letter from Leeds: [https://web.archive.org/web/20110615121738/http://www.comp.leeds.ac.uk/jubilee/Docs/Programming.jpg Image]

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[[Category:PeopleAcademics from London]]