Biography:Richard Bornat

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Short description: British computer scientist and engineer

Richard Bornat
Portrait photograph
Bornat at 70th Birthday
Born(1944-06-29)29 June 1944
England
Died8 January 2026(2026-01-08) (aged 81)
England
OccupationProfessor
Known forJape
TitleProfessor
Academic work
DisciplineComputer scientist
Sub-disciplineFormal methods
InstitutionsQueen Mary, University of London
Middlesex University
Doctoral studentsSamson Abramsky
Main interestsProgram proving
Notable worksUnderstanding and Writing Compilers: A Do It Yourself Guide (1979)
Programming from First Principles (1987)
Websitecs.mdx.ac.uk/prof-richard-bornat

Richard Bornat (29 June 1944 – 8 January 2026) was a British author and researcher in the field of computer science. He was a Professor of Computer Programming at Middlesex University. Previously, he was at Queen Mary, University of London.

Background

Bornat was the son of Charles Bornat, an English architect.[1] He was an academic at Queen Mary, University of London from 1977 to 2002, then moving to Middlesex University.

Research

Bornat's research interests included program proving in separation logic. His focus is on the proofs themselves, as opposed to any logical underpinnings. Much of the work involved discovering ways to state the properties of independent modules in a manner that makes their composition into useful systems conducive.

Bornat (in conjunction with Bernard Sufrin of the Oxford University Computing Laboratory[2]) developed Jape, a "proof calculator"; he was involved in research on the usability of this tool for exploration of novel proofs.

Richard Bornat's PhD students included Samson Abramsky in the early 1980s.

In 2004, one of Bornat's students developed an aptitude test to "divide people up into programmers and non-programmers before they ever come into contact with programming." The test was first given to a group of students in 2005 during an experiment on the use of mental models in programming.[3] In 2008 and 2014, Bornat partially retracted some of the claims,[4] impugning its validity as a test for programming capability.[5]

Over the last few years, Bornat worked on Quantum Programming. He implemented Qtpi, which is based on Gay and Nagarajan's CQP (Communicating Quantum Processes), using OCaml.

Publications

Bornat published a book entitled "Understanding and Writing Compilers: A Do It Yourself Guide" (first published in 1979), which is regarded as one of the most extensive resources on compiler development. Although it has been out of print for some time, he made it available as an online edition.[6]

Other publications from Bornat include:

  • R. Bornat; 1987; Programming from First Principles; Prentice Hall International Series in Computer Science; ISBN 0-13-729104-3.
  • Richard Bornat and Harold Thimbleby; 1989; The life and times of ded, display editor; in J.B. Long & A. Whitefield (eds); Cognitive Ergonomics and Human-Computer Interaction; Cambridge University Press; pp. 225–255.
  • Richard Bornat and Bernard Sufrin; 1999; Animating Formal Proof at the Surface: The {Jape} Proof Calculator; The Computer Journal; Vol. 42; no. 3; pp. 177–192.
  • Aczel, J. C., Fung, P., Bornat, R., Oliver, M., O'Shea, T., & Sufrin, B.; 1999; Influences of Software Design on Formal Reasoning; in Brewster, S., Cawsey, A. & Cockton, G. (Eds.) Proceedings of IFIP TC.13 International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction INTERACT '99; Vol. 2; pp. 3–4; Swindon, UK, British Computer Society; ISBN 1-902505-19-0.
  • R. Bornat; 2000; Proving Pointer Programs in Hoare Logic; in Backhouse & Oliveira (eds) MPC 2000; LNCS 1837; pp. 102–126.
  • C. Calcagno, P. O'Hearn, R. Bornat; 2002; Program Logic and Equivalence in the Presence of Garbage Collection. To appear in Theoretical Computer Science special issue on Foundations.
  • R. Bornat, J. Boender, F. Kammueller, G. Poly and R. Nagarajan; 2020; Describing and Simulating Concurrent Quantum Systems, Tool Demonstration Paper, In TACAS ’20: 26th International Conference on Tools and Algorithms for the Construction and Analysis of Systems, Dublin, Ireland, April 25–30, 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science.
  • Bornat, R., Nagarajan, R.; (2023); Describing and Animating Quantum Protocols, In: Palmigiano, A., Sadrzadeh, M. (eds), Samson Abramsky on Logic and Structure in Computer Science and Beyond. Outstanding Contributions to Logic, vol 25. Springer, Cham.

He also gave lively talks.[7][8]

References

  1. ↑ Stevenson, Graham (19 September 2008). "Charles Bornat". Encyclopedia of Communist Biographies. https://grahamstevenson.me.uk/2008/09/19/charles-bornat/. 
  2. ↑ Sufrin, Bernard (9 June 2009). "Richard punctures a windbag – for Richard Bornat, Aldeburgh, 9th June 2009" (PDF). UK: University of Oxford. https://www.cs.ox.ac.uk/people/bernard.sufrin/personal/Memoir.pdf. 
  3. ↑ Dehnadi, Saeed; Bornat, Richard (20 February 2006). "The camel has two humps". UK: School of Computing, Middlesex University. Archived from the original on 22 November 2009. https://web.archive.org/web/20091122080500/http://www.cs.mdx.ac.uk/research/PhDArea/saeed/paper1.pdf. 
  4. ↑ Bornat, Richard (24 July 2014). "Camels and humps: a retraction". London, UK: School of Science and Technology, Middlesex University. http://www.eis.mdx.ac.uk/staffpages/r_bornat/papers/camel_hump_retraction.pdf. 
  5. ↑ "The camel doesn't have two humps: Programming "aptitude test" canned for overzealous conclusion – Retraction Watch" (in en-US). Retraction Watch. 2014-07-18. http://retractionwatch.com/2014/07/18/the-camel-doesnt-have-two-humps-programming-aptitude-test-canned-for-overzealous-conclusion/. 
  6. ↑ Bornat, Richard (2020) (PDF). Understanding and Writing Compilers: A Do It Yourself Guide. London, UK: Middlesex University. http://www.eis.mdx.ac.uk/staffpages/r_bornat/books/compiling.pdf. Retrieved 12 January 2026. 
  7. ↑ Bornat, Richard (22 January 2004). "In defence of programming: inaugural lecture, delivered 22nd January 2004, corrected and revised April 13, 2005" (PDF). UK: Middlesex University. https://www.eis.mdx.ac.uk/staffpages/r_bornat/lectures/revisedinauguraltext.pdf. 
  8. ↑ Nagarajan, Rajagopal; Bornat, Richard (19 October 2021). "Webinar: Formal Modelling, Programming and Verification of Quantum Systems". BCS-FACS. https://www.bcs.org/events-calendar/2021/october/webinar-formal-modelling-programming-and-verification-of-quantum-systems/. 



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