Bill Atkinson won the respect of Steve Jobs by creating a high-level programming language in just 6 days

• Bill Atkinson died on June 5 After fighting pancreatic cancer. He was 74 years old. Atkinson was one of the first Apple employees, responsible for the main MAC programs and the user’s graphic interfaces. But he finally won his president, the founder of Apple Steve Jobs, by creating a copy of the Apple II computer in just six days.

His family wrote on Facebook that Bill Atkinson, who has worked for Apple since 1978 – years after its founding – to 1990 – died on June 5 after the fighting of the pancreatic cancer. It was 74.

Atkinson was the one and 51 employee in Apple, and was personally recruited by Steve Jobs. According to the Walter ISAACSON jobs, ATKINSON, a doctoral student at that time, refused to initially request Apple to attend the company. But Steve Jobs sent Atkinson a non -refundable plane ticket, then gave him a three -hour stadium about why he joined the company.

“Think of the surfing on the front edge of the wave,” she remembered Jobs told Atkinson about this meeting. “It is really pleasant. Now think about nullifying dogs at the end of that wave. It will not be anywhere near the fun. Come here and make us in the universe.”

Atkinson accepted the work offer, and as a result, the PhD degree has never ended.

Atkinson will continue to develop some of the main Apple software, including QuickDraw, which allowed old Apple computers to draw pictures and windows on the screen, and Hypercard, which is an easy -to -use software development group so that creators can build their own applications. He has also developed the Apple Lisa graphic interface, an introduction to Macintosh, and later many Mac user interfaces. But his first job is to develop a program that can track stock governor. The program will expand the Dow Jones service to get quotes, then hang.

His second project in Apple, though, was in the end how Atkinson won the respect of Jobs.

Jobs was resisting using a new Apple II programming language, one of the oldest and most popular personal computers in Apple that was born many caliphs – including Lisa, Apple III, Apple II Plus, Apple II, Apple IIC, and Apple IIC Plus – although most of these computers, with the exception of Apple failure IIE. Functions at that time resisted Apple II a new programming language, basic thinking, which is the simple programming language that worked to play the original Apple I, was all the Apple II needed forward. Atkinson, however, compress the jobs to build something better.

“Since you are very excited, I will give you six days to prove my mistake,” Jobs told ATKINSON, according to ISAACSON, to the Apple founder.

Certainly, in just six days, ATKINSON created a specialized version of PASCAL, a special level programming language made for Apple II. According to Isiakson, “The jobs are then respectful.”

Atkinson will later leave Apple in 1990 to register his private company called General Magic, which was built for the Slavs to USB and small touch screens. In 2007, he was an external developer to start a small operation called Numenta, which enhances what we know about human neuroscience to develop artificial intelligence. But Atkinson also spent most of his last years to work as a nature photographer, using a digital printing process, and the mobile phone application that has developed, to allow users to get out of their digital photos to send them via the postal or email service.

Atkinson succeeded his wife, two daughters, Rabik, the daughter of the father, two sisters, four sisters, his dog, the poppy, according to his family’s Facebook message.

This story was originally shown on Fortune.com

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2025-06-09 15:11:00