It is with regret that we report the passing of
Andrew Birrell, a true luminary in our field.
Andrew died peacefully at home on the morning of
December 7 after a three-year battle with cancer.
A native of Scotland, Andrew earned his PhD at
Cambridge University in 1978 under Roger Needham
for his work on the CAP Filing System and system programming in a high-level language. His
subsequent career at Xerox PARC, DEC SRC, and
Microsoft Research spanned almost four decades.
Andrew is perhaps best known for his seminal work
on Remote Procedure Call, on the Grapevine system,
one of the earliest examples of what came to be
known as distributed systems, and on his precise
treatise on Programming with Threads. He was not
just a distributed systems expert, however. His
CV includes important works in such diverse fields
as systems architecture, formal methods, low-level
OS functionality, and security. Moreover, Andrew
was a true systems builder: he took pride from
building artifacts from first principles and he
had the skill to do so. These skills had
real-world impact: his work on practical
prototypes of an electronic book reader, an
index-based web email system, and a portable music
player closely anticipated the commercial
offerings that many of us use today.
A recipient of the ACM Software Systems award in
1994, Andrew twice received the SOSP Hall of Fame
award for his work on Remote Procedure Call and on
Grapevine. He regularly served on SOSP Program
Committees and for many years helped SOSP General
Chairs by assembling and publishing the digital
output of the conference.
Andrew was known not only for his sharp intellect,
but also for the keen sense of style represented
in all things he designed and built. Perhaps it
is not surprising, therefore, that he was also a
skilled amateur wood-worker. It was always well
understood amongst his colleagues that Andrew's
calm and reasoned voice was worth hearing. His
insights have benefited the multiple generations
of young researchers who spent time working with
him.
