User:Softtest123

Softtest123
As you can see from his user name, he has an interest in software testing and refers to himself as a "Cyber Entomologist". A cyber entomologist is one who collects information and classifies computer software bugs.

He believes himself to be the originator of the motto and policy: "Garbage In, Apology Out."

If you want to see a bug he has collected, try invoking Microsoft Windows NT calculator (and all later versions of windows before Windows 7) and set the view to scientific mode and then type or paste in:

(((((((((((((((0=)))))))))))))))

(There are 15 open and close parentheses.) Nothing good happens, or try:

(0=)(2+2=)

For the latest calculator bugs see Microsoft Calculator Challenge.

He also has a general interest in mathematics and related fields, like the history of mathematics.

His other interests include music, photography and he really enjoys reading.

This year he will have 62 years of computing experience, mostly testing and diagnosing stuff.

He has degrees in Electrical Engineering and Commuter Science. When he was an undergraduate he took every computer course offered  - - - - -    both of them.

Previously he has taught CS 117, Programming for Scientists and Engineers, as a Part Time Instructor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). He has taught as Adjunct Faculty at Arizona State University and the Florida Institute of Technology.

He is the inventor of Bounded Floating Point.

Let's see, what else has he done?

Machines he has programmed
He has programmed a variety of machines:
 * ALWAC III-E
 * IBM 650
 * IBM 709 (and 7090)
 * GE 412, GE 225
 * GE/PAC 4040, 4050, 4060, 4010, 4400, 4500
 * Intel 8080, MOS 6502, Motorola 6800, Motorola 68HC11 and other chips
 * BBN Butterfly
 * MasPar
 * RS/6000
 * And the venerable Intel PC Architecture

Languages he has programmed
He has programmed in:
 * Machine code
 * Assembly language
 * GECOM
 * Forward Sort/Merge Generator (a marvelous program for generating efficient magnetic tape sorts using Fibbinocci's series).
 * COBOL
 * FORTRAN I, II, IV, V, 80, 95
 * Pascal
 * Lucid
 * BASIC (in many forms including the original on GE Timesharing into Dartmouth with a model 33 TTY).
 * C
 * A microprogramming register transfer language of his own design.

Courses he has taught
He has taught:
 * Machine and Assembly language Programming
 * Microprogramming
 * Microprocessor Organization
 * Software testing
 * Software maintenance
 * Introduction to Computers
 * Introduction to Programming (Fortran 95)
 * Programming for Scientists and Engineers

Techonology he has introduced
He has introduced technologies:
 * Automated Hardware Diagnostics Generation
 * Generalized Microcoded Controllers
 * Hostile Data Stream Testing
 * Bounded Floating Point

Publications
Guha, Ratan K., and Alan A. Jorgensen, "Debugging Parallel C Language Programs for the BBN GP1000 Butterfly Using Turbo C," Proceedings of the Second Software Engineering Research Forum, Rita Virginia Rodriques, Ed, SERF, 1992, pp 123-131.

Whittaker, James A. and Alan A. Jorgensen, “Why Software Fails.” ACM Software Engineering Notes, July 1999. Also awarded “Best Presentation” at STAR EAST 1999, Orlando, Florida.

Becker, S., and A. Jorgensen, “A Recursive Approach to Software Development”, Proceedings of the 2000 Information Resource Management Association (IRMA) Conference, Anchorage, Alaska, May 2000.

Jorgensen, A., and J. Whittaker, “An API Testing Method” Proceedings STAR EAST 2000, Orlando, Florida, May, 2000.

Whittaker, J., and A. Jorgensen, “How to Break Software” Keynote presentation, EUROSTAR 2000, Copenhagen, Denmark, December 6, 2000, Keynote presentation, ASIASTAR 2001, Sydney, Australia, July 9, 2001.

Jorgensen, A., “Software Testability: Lessons from Hardware Testing,” Proceedings, Nineteenth Annual Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference, Portland, Oregon, October 15-17, 2001. Presented as a Keynote Address, Software Testing, Australia/New Zealand (STANZ) Conference, November 25-26, 2002.

Jorgensen, Alan, “Random Testing (Illustrated)”, Proceedings, 2nd Asia-Pacific Conference on Software Testing, AsiaSTAR 2002, Melbourne, Australia, July 22-24, 2002.

Jorgensen, Alan A., “Testing with Hostile Data Streams”, ACM Software Engineering Notes, March 2003.

Jorgensen, Alan and Tilley, Scott. “On the Security Risks of Not Adopting Hostile Data Stream Testing Techniques.” Proceedings of the 3rd International Workshop on Adoption-Centric Software Engineering (ACSE 2003: May 9, 2003; Portland, OR), pp. 99-103. Published as CMU/SEI-2003-SR-004. Pittsburgh, PA: Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, June 2003.

Other things he has contributed
Seems like he has fixed a lot of real-time process control computers, many in nuclear power stations, so he thinks he is a troubleshooter.

He is also a tool maker and has developed many tools that he frequently uses to solve problems he is working on. For example, he has developed the Useful Self Replicating Program (USRP), a compiler compiler compiler that wrote itself and ported itself to other (recursive) languages. Very useful for quickly writing parsers from very large attributed grammars.

He has baked bread for Subway and made A&W Root Beer Floats, but not now, since he is gainfully employed doing the work he spent his life learning how to do.

As a member of the Association for Software Testing Special Interest Group on Electronic Voting, he has contributed to the collaboration of that group on developing recommendations to the Election Assistance Commission on the 2007 Voluntary Voting Systems Guidelines by helping to establish a wiki. He learned that skill as a Wikipedian.(2007-present)

Recently (2012-2013) he has contributed to the design of computer based and instructor led training courses for defensive (secure) COBOL programming.

Contributions to Wikipedia

 * His first contribution was Abax
 * Reformatting the citations for History of the Church-Turing Thesis
 * Editing of Fuzzing History
 * History of RTA Special Election Controversy
 * From time-to-time he adds in-line citations or creates a page when looking for something and he can't find it in Wikipedia.
 * Lately (2013-current) he has been cleaning up link rot.
 * Giving extra credit to students for updating Wikipedia computer science articles.

Have a Nice Day!
Thanks for checking me out, have a fine day,

Alan A. Jorgensen, Ph.D.