TOP-5 Most Influential Programmers Working Today

The advancement of programming is one of the biggest hallmarks of the 21^st century. it has completely changed the landscape of computing throughout the world. The great advancements in this field are a result of the hard work of the giants of the past. Now, the programmers of this generation have taken this field to greater heights. The programming languages of the past such as Basic and Fortran paved the way for modern languages such as C programming language and Python.

Behind each of these programming milestones are dedicated experts. Some of the top-5 most influential programmers working today are discussed below.

Tim Berners-Lee

Tim Berners-Lee was born in 1955. He is a professor of computer science at MIT. In addition, he is a fellow at the prestigious University of Oxford. Tim is well-known for his creation of the World Wide Web as we know it today. His work began in 1989 when he established the very first connection between the server and HTTP client through the internet. This achievement cemented his name as a legend of internet development.

Due to Tim’s success, it holds a position on the World Wide Web Consortium as a director. This consortium supervises the general advancement of the World Wide Web.

Richard Stallman

Richard Stallman is credited for the development of GNU, which is a replica of Unix. The only difference is that GNU is an open-source and free platform that lets users use and modify the software at no charge. Richard single-handedly spared headed the creation of a free software application developed for a specific operating system. This creation gave users a significant amount of freedom with the exception of the kernel. However, the Linux kernel was used as the last piece of the block, which completed the GNU/Linux project as an open-source system.

James Gosling

James Gosling is considered the founder of the Java programming language. His work was instrumental in creating Java, which quickly gains significant acceptance within the programming community. Now, Java is used to power several components within various platforms, which include televisions, computers, mobile devices, web servers, and much more. James’ achievement was developing a programming language (Java) capable of seamlessly executing on any type of computer and operating system. At the heart of the Java programming language, James uses the syntax of C and C++ programming languages.

Linus Torvalds

Linus Torvalds is a software engineer with dual nationality – Sweden and the United States. He was the brains behind the development of the Linux kernel. Since the creation of the Linux kernel, it has been instrumental in the development of several operating systems including Android. In addition, he was heavily involved in the development of Subsurface and the redesign of Git.

Rasmus Lerdorf

Rasmus Lerdorf is another famous programmer with dual nationality – Denmark and Canada. He was one of the people that were involved in the development of the PHP scripting language. He was involved in the development of the first and the second versions of this language. At the moment, Rasmus is still involved in the progress of programming in general.

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