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Association for Computing Machinery



 
 
The Association for Computing Machinery, or ACM, was founded in 1947 as the world's first scientific and educational computing
Computing

Computing is usually defined as the activity of using and developing computer technology, computer hardware and computer software. It is the computer-specific part of information technology....
 society. Its membership was approximately 83,000 as of 2007. Its headquarters are in New York City
New York City

The City of New York is the List of United States cities by population in the United States, while the New York metropolitan area ranks among the List of urban areas by population....
.

is organized into over 170 local chapters and 34 Special Interest Group
Special Interest Group

In technical fields, a Special Interest Group is a community with a particular interest in a specific technical area. Members of a SIG cooperate to effect or to produce solutions within their particular field, and often meet regularly, particularly at business conference....
s (SIGs), through which it conducts most of its activities. Additionally, there are over 500 college and university .






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Encyclopedia


The Association for Computing Machinery, or ACM, was founded in 1947 as the world's first scientific and educational computing
Computing

Computing is usually defined as the activity of using and developing computer technology, computer hardware and computer software. It is the computer-specific part of information technology....
 society. Its membership was approximately 83,000 as of 2007. Its headquarters are in New York City
New York City

The City of New York is the List of United States cities by population in the United States, while the New York metropolitan area ranks among the List of urban areas by population....
.

Activities

ACM is organized into over 170 local chapters and 34 Special Interest Group
Special Interest Group

In technical fields, a Special Interest Group is a community with a particular interest in a specific technical area. Members of a SIG cooperate to effect or to produce solutions within their particular field, and often meet regularly, particularly at business conference....
s (SIGs), through which it conducts most of its activities. Additionally, there are over 500 college and university . The first student chapter was founded in 1961 at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette
University of Louisiana at Lafayette

The University of Louisiana at Lafayette, or UL Lafayette, is a coeducational public research university located in Lafayette, Louisiana, Louisiana, in the heart of Acadiana....
.

Many of the SIGs, like SIGGRAPH
ACM SIGGRAPH

ACM SIGGRAPH is the New York-based Association for Computing Machinery's Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques....
, SIGPLAN
SIGPLAN

SIGPLAN is the Association for Computing Machinery's Special Interest Group on programming languages....
 and SIGCOMM
SIGCOMM

SIGCOMM is the Association for Computing Machinery's Special Interest Group on Data Communications, which specializes in the field of communication and computer networks....
, sponsor regular conferences which have become famous as the dominant venue for presenting new innovations in certain fields. The groups also publish a large number of specialized journals, magazines, and newsletters.

ACM also sponsors other computer science related events such as the worldwide ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest
ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest

ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest is an annual multi-tiered computer programming competition among the universities of the world....
 (ICPC), and has sponsored some other events such as the chess match between Garry Kasparov
Garry Kasparov

Garry Kasparov is a Russian former World Chess Champion, regarded by many as Methods for comparing top chess players throughout history. He is also a writer and political activist....
 and the IBM Deep Blue computer.

Services

ACM Press publishes a prestigious academic journal, Journal of the ACM
Journal of the ACM

The Journal of the ACM is the scientific journal of the Association for Computing Machinery in the broad area of computer science. It was started in 1954....
, and general magazines for computer professionals, Communications of the ACM
Communications of the ACM

Communications of the ACM is the flagship monthly journal of the Association for Computing Machinery . First published in 1957, CACM is sent to all ACM members, currently numbering about 80,000....
 (also known as Communications or CACM) and Queue
ACM Queue

ACM Queue is a computer magazine published by the Association for Computing Machinery . Stephen R. Bourne helped found the magazine when he was President of the ACM and he is now Chair of the Advisory Board....
. Other publications of the ACM include:
  • ACM Crossroads
    ACM Crossroads

    ACM Crossroads is a current information science journal published in both print and electronic forms by the Association for Computing Machinery....
    , the most popular student computing journal in USA
  • A number of journals, specific to subfields of computer science, titled ACM Transactions. Some of the more prominent transactions include:
    • ACM Transactions on Computer Systems (TOCS)
    • ACM Transactions on Database Systems (TODS)
    • ACM Transactions on Graphics
      ACM Transactions on Graphics

      ACM Transactions on Graphics is a quarterly scientific journal that aims to disseminate the latest findings of note in the field of computer graphics....
       (TOG)
    • ACM Transactions on Programming Languages and Systems (TOPLAS)


Although Communications no longer publishes primary research, and is not considered a prestigious venue, many of the great debates and results in computing history have been published in its pages, see the article on Communications of the ACM
Communications of the ACM

Communications of the ACM is the flagship monthly journal of the Association for Computing Machinery . First published in 1957, CACM is sent to all ACM members, currently numbering about 80,000....
.

ACM has made almost all of its publications available to paid subscribers online at its and also has a . It also offers insurance and other services to its members.

Digital Library

The contains a comprehensive archive of the organization's journals, magazines, and conference proceedings. Online services include a forum called Ubiquity and Tech News digest.

ACM requires the copyright of all submissions to be assigned to the organization as a condition of publishing the work. Authors may post the documents on their own websites, but they are required to link back to the digital library's reference page for the paper. Though authors are not allowed to charge for access to copies of their work, downloading a copy from the ACM site requires a paid subscription.

Competition

ACM's primary historical competitor has been the IEEE Computer Society
IEEE Computer Society

IEEE Computer Society is an organizational unit of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers . It was established in 1963 when the American Institute of Electrical Engineers and the Institute of Radio Engineers merged to create the IEEE....
, which is the largest subgroup of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers or IEEE is an international non-profit, professional body for the advancement of technology related to electricity....
. The IEEE focuses more on hardware and standardization issues than theoretical computer science
Computer science

Computer science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation, and of practical techniques for their implementation and application in computer systems....
, but there is considerable overlap with the ACM's agenda. They occasionally cooperate on projects like developing computer science curricula.

There is also a mounting challenge to the ACM's publication practices coming from the open access
Open access

Open access -- free online access -- can be provided in two ways: open access publishing and open access self-archiving, by its authors, of non-open-access publications ....
 movement. Some authors see a centralized peer-review process as less relevant and publish on their home pages or on unreviewed sites like arXiv
ArXiv

The arXiv is an archive for electronic preprints of scientific papers in the fields of mathematics, physics, computer science, quantitative biology and statistics which can be accessed via the Internet....
. Other organizations have sprung up which do their peer review entirely free and online, such as Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research (JAIR)
Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research

The Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research is a free on-line peer-reviewed scholarly journal publishing papers in all areas of artificial intelligence....
, Journal of Machine Learning Research (JMLR)
Journal of Machine Learning Research

The Journal of Machine Learning Research , is a scientific journal focusing on machine learning, a subfield of artificial intelligence. It was founded in 2000....
 and the .

Fellows

The ACM Fellows Program was established by Council of the Association for Computing Machinery in 1993 "to recognize and honor outstanding ACM members for their achievements in computer science and information technology and for their significant contributions to the mission of the ACM."

There are presently about 500 Fellows out of about 60,000 professional members.

A full list can be found on .

Special Interest Groups


Conferences

The ACM sponsors numerous conferences listed below. Most of the special interest groups also have an annual conference. ACM conferences are often very popular publishing venues and are therefore very competitive. For example, the 2007 SIGGRAPH
SIGGRAPH

SIGGRAPH is the name of the annual conference on computer graphics convened by the Association for Computing Machinery ACM SIGGRAPH organization....
 conference attracted about 30000 visitors, and CIKM only accepted 15% of the long papers that were submitted in 2005.
  • CHI
    CHI (conference)

    The ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems series of academic conferences is generally considered the most prestigious in the field of human-computer interaction....
     Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
  • : Conference on Information and Knowledge Management
  • : Design Automation Conference
  • : Federated Computing Research Conference
  • : Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference
  • SIGGRAPH
    SIGGRAPH

    SIGGRAPH is the name of the annual conference on computer graphics convened by the Association for Computing Machinery ACM SIGGRAPH organization....
     Graphics and Interactive Techniques
  • : Conference on Hypertext and Hypermedia
  • : Joint Conference on Digital Libraries
  • OOPSLA
    OOPSLA

    OOPSLA is an annual Association for Computing Machinery conference.OOPSLA is an annual conference covering topics on object-oriented programming systems, languages and applications....
    : International conference on Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages, and Applications
  • : International conference on World Wide Web


Leadership

The President of the ACM for 2008–2010 is Wendy Hall
Wendy Hall

Dame Wendy Hall Order of the British Empire Royal Academy of Engineering is Professor of Computer Science at the University of Southampton in England....
 of the University of Southampton
University of Southampton

The University of Southampton is a British public university located in the city of Southampton, England. The origins of the university can be dated back to the founding of the Hartley Institution in 1862 by Henry Robertson Hartley....
.

ACM is led by a Council consisting of the President, Vice-President, Treasurer, Past President, SIG Governing Board Chair, Publications Board Chair, three representatives of the SIG Governing Board, and seven Members-At-Large. This institution is often referred to simply as "Council" in Communications of the ACM.

Infrastructure

ACM has five “Boards” that make up various committees and subgroups, to help Headquarters staff maintain quality services and products. These boards are as follows:

  1. Publications Board
  2. SIG Governing Board
  3. Education Board
  4. Membership Services Board
  5. Professions Board


ACM's Committee on Women in Computing

ACM's committee on women in computing
Women in computing

Global concerns about current and future roles of women in computing occupations gained more importance with the emerging information age. These concerns motivated public policy debates addressing gender equality as computer applications exerted increasing influence in society....
 is set up to support, inform, celebrate, and work with women in computing. Dr. Anita Borg
Anita Borg

Anita Borg was an United States computer science. She was born Anita Borg Naffz in Chicago, Illinois. She grew up in Palatine, Illinois, Kaneohe, Hawaii, and Mukilteo, Washington....
 was a great supporter of ACM-W. ACM-W provides various resources for women in computing as well as high school girls interested in the field. ACM-W also reaches out internationally to those women who are involved and interested in computing.

Chapters


ACM has three kinds of chapters: Special Interest Group
Special Interest Group

In technical fields, a Special Interest Group is a community with a particular interest in a specific technical area. Members of a SIG cooperate to effect or to produce solutions within their particular field, and often meet regularly, particularly at business conference....
, Professional, and Student chapters.



Professional Chapters include
  • Baltimore ACM Chapter (BACM):
  • District of Columbia ACM Chapter (DCACM):


Student Chapters include
  • Yeshwantrao Chavan College of Engineering,India [(ycce)acm]:
  • Birla Institute of Technology & Science, India (BITS-ACM)
  • Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPIACM):
  • Johns Hopkins University (JHUACM):
  • University of the Philippines (UPACM):


See also

  • Timeline of computing (750 BC – 1949)
  • Edmund Berkeley
    Edmund Berkeley

    Edmund Callis Berkeley was an American computer scientist who co-founded the Association for Computing Machinery in 1947. He was also a social activist who worked to achieve conditions that might minimize the threat of nuclear war....
    , co-founder
  • ACM Classification Scheme
  • Grace Murray Hopper Award
    Grace Murray Hopper Award

    The original Grace Murray Hopper Awards have been awarded by the Association for Computing Machinery since 1971. The award goes to a young computer professional who makes a single, significant technical or service contribution....
    , awarded by the ACM
  • Turing Award
    Turing Award

    The A. M. Turing Award is given annually by the Association for Computing Machinery to "an individual selected for contributions of a technical nature made to the computing community....
  • Artificial Intelligence
    Artificial intelligence

    Artificial intelligence is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science which aims to create it. Major AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents,"...
  • Dr. Franz Alt
    Franz Alt (mathematician)

    Dr. Franz Leopold Alt is an Austrian born United States mathematician who made major contributions to computer science in its early days.Franz Alt grew up in Austria and received a Ph.D....
    , former president.
  • Bernard Galler
    Bernard Galler

    Bernard A. Galler was an American mathematician and computer scientist at the University of Michigan who was involved in the development of large-scale operating systems and computer languages including the MAD programming language and the Michigan Terminal System operating system....
    , former president.
  • ACM Crossroads
    ACM Crossroads

    ACM Crossroads is a current information science journal published in both print and electronic forms by the Association for Computing Machinery....
    , one of its magazines
  • ACM Transactions on Graphics
    ACM Transactions on Graphics

    ACM Transactions on Graphics is a quarterly scientific journal that aims to disseminate the latest findings of note in the field of computer graphics....
    , one of the journals it publishes.
  • ACM Transactions on Mathematical Software
    ACM Transactions on Mathematical Software

    ACM Transactions on Mathematical Software is a quarterly scientific journal that aims to disseminate the latest findings of note in the field of numeric, symbolic, algebraic, and geometric computing applications....
    , one of the journals it publishes.
  • ACM Guide to Computing Literature
    ACM Guide to Computing Literature

    ACM Guide to Computing Literature is a database, published by the Association for Computing Machinery , that categorizes and abstracts most computer science literature....
    , a database of computer science literature
  • UP ACM, the only ACM chapter in the Philippines
    Philippines

    The Philippines, officially known as the Republic of the Philippines, is a country in Southeast Asia with Manila as its capital city. It comprises 7,107 islands in the western Pacific Ocean....
     and three-time Chapter Excellence winner.


External links

  • for publications