The Green language proposal, submitted for a United States Department of Defense competition, secured Jean Ichbiah’s role as the chief designer of the Ada programming language. This project shifted his professional trajectory toward standardized compiler systems, establishing a foundation for his subsequent corporate ventures in France and the United States throughout the final decades of the twentieth century.
Academic and Early Professional Foundation
Born in the 11th arrondissement of Paris in 1940, Ichbiah pursued an education at the École polytechnique and the École Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées. He furthered his studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1964. His early career involved joining CII in 1967, where he contributed to the development of the Siris 8 operating system for the CII Iris 80 mainframe. During the 1970s, he chaired the Simula User’s Group and co-founded IFIP WG 2.4, an organization focused on systems implementation languages. Between 1972 and 1974, he engineered LIS, an experimental language derived from Pascal and Simula.
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In 1978, the Department of Defense selected Ichbiah's Green language design for its embedded systems requirements. Rebranded as Ada, the language became the focus of his work for several years. To facilitate the continued definition and standardization of Ada 83, Ichbiah founded Alsys in La Celle-Saint-Cloud in 1980. The company eventually expanded its operations to include a subsidiary in Waltham, Massachusetts, providing validated compiler systems for clients such as NASA and the United States Army. Ichbiah served as the chief executive officer of Alsys until 1991, at which point the company entered a series of mergers, eventually becoming part of Aonix.
Technological Contributions and Late Career
During the 1990s, Ichbiah turned his attention to human-computer interaction, resulting in the design of the FITALY keyboard layout. This system was specifically optimized for stylus and touch-based input devices. He launched Textware Solutions to distribute this software, which supported text entry for tablet PCs, PDAs, and medical transcription tools. Throughout his career, his work received formal recognition, including an appointment as a Knight of the Legion of Honour in 1979 and his selection as a correspondent of the French Academy of Sciences. He also received a Certificate of Distinguished Service from the United States Department of Defense.
Fast facts
- Born: 1940, 11th arrondissement of Paris
- Died: 2007, Boston
- Education: École polytechnique, MIT (1964)
- Primary Employers: CII (1967-1980), Alsys (1980-1991)
- Notable Language Design: Ada
- Keyboard Layout Innovation: FITALY
- Award: Knight of the Legion of Honour (1979)
- Professional Membership: French Academy of Sciences
Questions readers ask
What was the primary purpose of the Alsys corporation?
Founded by Ichbiah in 1980, Alsys was created to support the definition and standardization of the Ada programming language and to develop validated Ada compiler systems.
What is the FITALY layout?
FITALY is a keyboard layout designed by Ichbiah in the 1990s, optimized for efficient input on touch screens and stylus-based devices.
Achievements
- Knight of the Legion of Honour — 1979
- Notable work: FITALY
- Affiliated with CII and Alsys
- Educated at École polytechnique, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and École Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées
- Worked as computer scientist and engineer
