I bought my first computer in 1978, a KIM 1, 6502, 8-bitter. I designed and built a video controller to
produce ascii output on TV.
I always loved tiling puzzles: pentominos, squaring and triangulation. See
squaring.net
for my contribution on squaring cylinders and triangulations in the seventies.
I obtained my master in Electrical Engineering, Twente University, 1982.
After that, I worked at Twente University on functional language research and functional compilers
(Sasl, Twentel) as part of my social service.
I joined Philips Research in 1984 and started in an Esprit project on parallel computing: DOOM
(Distributed Object Oriented Machine) + POOL (Parallel Object Oriented Language). I architected the
Pool compiler.
For that Pool compiler I designed the compiler generation Elegant (bootstrapped by hand and
thereafter self-generating) and did a PhD on functional programing and compiler construction in
1993. Elegant was succeeded by the
Front compiler generator, which was
used heavily to design domain specific languages (including Front itself of course).
I moved to traditional (C, C++) compilation in 1995 as the architect of Trimedia VLIW compiler.
After Trimedia, I worked on compilers for code compaction and reconfigurable computing till 2002.
Then I moved to a start-up, Silicon Hive. I was the architect of the VLIW C compiler which is
fully run-time parameterized by a processor description. I led the compiler team and was a member
of the management team from the start. We designed media processors for Samsung (video
decoding in TV) and Intel (imaging in embedded camera). The Front compiler generator was heavily
used for the C compiler, the machine description language Tim (The Incredible Machine), the
hardware design language CHDL and many intermediate languages.
I did camera hacking in 2005-2006, resulting in the Undutchables EOS 300D firmware release. I
specialize in high speed and high voltage photography using home-brew systems. See
lex-
augusteijn.nl for some results.
Silicon Hive was acquired by Intel 2011. There, I moved to camera firmware architecture and
stopped with an early retirement in 2016.
However, I became a consultant to the
GrAI Matter Labs start-up (neuromorphic computing) in 2018.
I am married since 1985, have two kids, boy and girl, and one grandson (this year).
By: Lex Augusteijn