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Dr. John Edward Warnock

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Stanford University University of Utah

John Warnock Obituary

Warnock

Dr. John Edward Warnock

October 6, 1940 - August 19, 2023

Co-founder of Adobe (former CEO and Co-Chairman of the Board), B.S. in Mathematics & Philosophy, PhD in Electrical Engineering (Computer Science) from the University of Utah; Inventor, Visionary, Philanthropist

Dr. John Edward Warnock, affectionately known to his family and closest friends as "Bill", passed away Saturday, August 19, 2023 at age 82, after a nearly two-year battle with pancreatic cancer. Widely recognized as one of America's greatest technology inventors, Warnock co-founded Adobe in 1982 with Dr. Charles "Chuck" Geschke. Warnock received multiple awards for his inventions in the U.S. and abroad, including the prestigious National Medal of Technology and Innovation presented by President Barack Obama in 2008, the Marconi Society Prize in 2010, Oxford University's Bodleian Medal in 2003, and the IEEE Computer Entrepreneur Award in 2008, to name just a few. Warnock joined Geschke at Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center) in 1978 and together they developed Interpress, a page description language that could enable laser printers to process text and images from newly emerging personal computers. When their vision to develop Interpress to work in a device-independent manner was rejected by Xerox, they left and founded Adobe and invented Postscript, which launched the revolution in desktop publishing. Postscript is based on an interpretive programming language that Warnock had championed over the years. By late 1986, Warnock had also invented Adobe Illustrator, the application which uses bÃ©zier curves to render infinitely scalable graphics. He was inspired by his wife, Marva, to automate many of the manual tasks she utilized as a graphic designer. In the spring of 1991, Warnock outlined a system called "Camelot", that evolved into the Portable Document Format (PDF) file-format. The goal was to "effectively capture documents from any application, send electronic versions of these documents anywhere, and view and print these documents on any machine" and to equip it with text searching capabilities. In 2021 it was estimated that 2.5 trillion documents were in the PDF format.

Warnock grew up in Holladay, Utah, southeast of Salt Lake City. Warnock graduated from the University of Utah with a B.S. in mathematics and philosophy. For his Master's thesis, he solved a previously unsolved mathematical problem in ring theory, and earned his PhD in Electrical Engineering (Computer Science). He also solved what is now known as the "Warnock Algorithm", enabling computers to render solid and interlocking objects at a time when most computer renderings could only produce simple line drawings. A computer-generated illustration based on this work was featured on the cover of Scientific American in 1970.

Warnock set a high standard for Silicon Valley tech entrepreneurs and leaders. He was a humble, modest, and generous person and is known to have said that "great ideas come from everywhere in the company". Warnock and his wife Marva endowed a Chair in Medicine at Stanford University and a Computer Science, Mathematics and Fine Arts Chair at the University of Utah, including a cornerstone grant, establishing the John and Marva Warnock Engineering Building at the University of Utah in 2007. The couple also endowed a chair at the Moran Eye Center in Ophthalmology, which supports the Global Outreach Division's work to treat preventable blindness in Utah and around the world. John was extraordinarily multidimensional. He was an avid skier, gifted painter, and art and rare book collector. He was also the Founding Chairman of the Tech Museum of Innovation from 1995 to 1999.

Amongst his numerous achievements, Dr. Warnock was above all a loving husband and father. He is survived by his wife, Marva, and their three children, Christopher (Barbara), Jeffrey, and Alyssa (Todd), and four grandchildren, John-Alex, Joshua, Kaia and Gunnar. In the words of Adobe Systems' current CEO, Shantanu Narayen, "John's brilliance and technology innovations changed the world. It is a sad day for the Adobe community and the industry for which he has been an inspiration for decades." Services private

To plant trees in memory, please visit the Sympathy Store.

Published by The Washington Post on Sep. 2, 2023.

Memories and Condolences
for John Warnock

16 Entries

Tony

January 15, 2024

To the family, many, many friends and colleagues of this nice man Mr. John Warnock fine comfort with you during this difficult time in your lives. Mr. John Warnock was a computer scientist and tech businessman who co-founded Adobe Systems, makers of software mainstays like Illustrator, Photoshop, and the ubiquitous PDF file format. There is no greater pain there could be than losing someone you love, especially when it is unexpected. We will miss Mr. John Warnock's presence and his many contributions to his community as a businessman. Thank you for Mr. John Warnock's contribution to the new technology, which was at the forefront of the company´s attempts to push technical boundaries. May the love and the special memory you shared and cherish with him show just how much your life was touched by him. May you find comfort in your wealth of fond memories together with Mr. John Warnock. May the God of comfort bless your grieving hearts with strength, loving kindness and peace as the world copes with the loss of Mr. John Warnock. He will be greatly missed, but not forgotten.

George Warnock

October 14, 2023

John Warnock was a Pantheon technological giant in the 60's he would solve any computer problem when regular people went to party in the Hippie days His creation of PDF filing sysytem revolutionized the printing world. Even my brother, John Warnock, who lives in Lakeland decided to work for Xerox and learned how to fix corporate Printers in the 80"s So in the 1990's "Bill Warnock put his DNA into the familyTreeDna.com website because his Warnock line came from Canada, but we know Canada was Indian Country and Warnock is an Irish name so he didn"t originate from there he was a 3rd cousin that left Burke County Georgia in 1700's he didn't live long enough to investigate it so his name sits on the list of Warnocks he comes from an area where an Irish man would have 15 sons called County Downs Ireland we share a paternal grandfather God Bless him and he will always be remembered George Warnock NYC

Rolando Barahona

October 2, 2023

No tuve la oportunidad de conocer físicamente al Dr. Warnock, sin embargo está presente en cada momento de nuestra existencia. Como Diseñador Gráfico utilizo desde hace 33 años sus creaciones e innovaciones tecnológicas, tales como Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop y PDF.

Gracias por existir y por dejarnos ese legado tan importante para nuestra profesión, de igual manera gracias a su esposa Marva, por ser fuente de inspiración.

Mis condolencias desde ciudad de Guatemala, Centro América.

Daniel Gordon

September 28, 2023

Rest in peace Bill, it was a pleasure to meet you and your family.

stanlee gatti

Planted Trees

Mr JR.

September 5, 2023

My condolences.

Anthony Christensen

September 1, 2023

As I have associated with John over 30 years he continues to surprise as his humanity has expanded. I remember his excitement as he related his experience in Ethiopia where he went with a team of Doctors and his grand children to restore sight to "blind men walking" by applyong modern medicine with a simple procedure. His humility and appreciation were palpable. As he introduced his Important collection of Indian Artifacts in special exhibit at the Cody Museum His voice cracked and his eyes watered in Humility and appreciation for the traditions and works of the American Indians. I always found John to have uncommon greatness and I am reminded of Socrates who said "wonder is the beginning of wisdom" His successes only enhanced his humanity-what a rare gift-Anthony Christensen

Dr. Alan, G. D. Hoffman

August 31, 2023

I first learned about John Warnock and postscript back in the mid 1980s and I reached out to him and was amazed at how personable and helpful he was. What an amazing man and what a legacy.

Jack Morris

August 30, 2023

As an undergraduate at the U of Utah Electrical Engineering Computer Science department in the late 1960's, I remember John joining the department to teach computer science courses and work on computer graphics. Under David Evans' direction, the Department was focused on Computer Graphics and had recruited Donald Sutherland from MIT Cambridge, to bolster the department with the latest computer graphics technology and applied geometric mathematical techniques. Computer graphics systems were primarily calligraphic, meaning that they displayed images as a sequence of line segments the way you would draw an image with a pen or pencil. The nascent technology was raster graphics, in which the image would be painted one raster line at the time, similar to how a TV works. It was John Warnock who realized that this raster technology would be amenable to surface rather than line representation images. And from this he saw that if you could sort the surface patches describing the object, you could present a realistic image without annoying hidden lines or more appropriately, hidden surfaces. He wrote his doctoral thesis on this and it was so innovative that the finished paper was less than 20 pages long. Essentially he invented the calculus of computer graphics defining the mathematical foundation on which all present computer graphics systems are based. Leaving the University, he did not rest on his laurels. As he did with his hidden surface algorithm, he thought outside the box. He could see better than anyone, how computational graphics could be used in the publishing industry. This led to computer generated fonts that could deal mathematically with difficulties in scaling and placement. And his most well-known contribution, a computer graphics language to efficiently generate print copy, known as PDF. I consider myself privileged to have known him and to have taken courses from him.

Janice Nelson

August 29, 2023

Please let his wife know that her many friends at Town Club are thinking if her and hoping she is doing ok thru this difficult time.

Pat Marriott

August 26, 2023

John was the heart of Adobe. It wasn't just his brilliance, but his warmth. There will never be another like him. A light has gone out in the world.

wendy and mel lavitt

August 22, 2023

The world has lost a wonderful man, who besides being smart was so kind to all who knew him, withnso many wonderful interests. Lots of love sending to Marva. A huge loss for the any who adored him.

Franklin Lassman

August 22, 2023

What a visionary! In 1983 I was a senior vice president of marketing at Linotype and he informed me of a language called Postscript. He foresaw the desktop, publishing resolution, and urgently needed typefaces that could be produced in Postscript. I have many wonderful memories of John and Chuck, and will never forget his reaction when the original artwork for TIMES ROMAN was created. The rest is hustory!

Robert (Bob) Reed Van Tuyl

August 22, 2023

I was a sort of distant colleague of John for about 4 years on the Illiac IV Project in the early 70s. I did Software Engineering since that was what I was good at. John made headlines. I am so sorry for his loss.

lee murdock

August 21, 2023

My life was happier and full of pride for having been in his path.

lee murdock

August 21, 2023

I knew John as a genius and a gentleman who made it fun to be in his presence. My affiliation was during his PHD completion and immediately afterward. I spent the rest of his life thankful for the memories but delighted in his every achievement. I don't know how many times I said I know John Warnock but it was many. To Marva, my heart aches for you because I saw how you and your Bill were a hand and glove couple. We are better because of both of you. Thanks forever.

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