Maurice Gittens Home Page

Hi, welcome to the Maurice Gittens home page. Since this is my personal home page I'll actually have to say something about myself won't I? So here we go.

My favourate excercise in life is to learn. To me learning is living, so I love to live. My current hobbies just reflect that which I'm learning at the current time. This page shared some of the things I'm currently enjoying.

I love music. To me good music is mathematics properly applied. It has many fascinating aspects which I, as bass player, try to share with my fellow music makers. From the perspective of a bassplayer, playing music is the challenge and the pleasure of making "musical space", for my fellow musicians. The first rule in my style of playing is to create freedom for others. Then you proceed to make use of the "space" your fellow musicians give you. And then you go, on and on and on.

To me, this is living.

To me computer science is like music, lot's of fun. I'm the type of person who likes to notice  that computers are so simple and yet quite sofisticated at the same time. I view computer science as -you guessed it- applied mathematics. As a result, formal models for computers interest me very much. 

My model of choice for computers are called phrase structure grammars. Basically these grammars allow me to formalize my thoughts. They are also fundamental in computer science theory, right up there with Turing machines and lambda calculus. I've developed a special class of phrase structure grammars called dotted grammars.  These grammars allow me to be able to parse non context free grammars both deterministically and efficiently.

Working on semantics of logical formalisms has convinced me that there is progress to be made in the field of knowlegde representation systems. The one I've been working on for a few years now is called ObjectTalks. I hope to make a first release soonish.

My favourate programming language is C++. It's a nice language because it allows abstract models (needed to design, implement and maintain software systems in a efficient and effective manner) to be implemented efficiently and effectively on common computer systems. To use the language effectively does however require that one thoroughly understand object oriented modeling and common computer system architectures. To me this is not a high price to pay. 

After some experience with Java, it turns out that I don't like the language as much as I expected to. The main reason I don't like the language is the inefficiency its usage currently entails. I guess the promise was to good to be true.

I enjoy reading the Bible. It helps me to accept that I'm not perfect. This is my incentive to accept the imperfections of others as well. From a less personal perspective it is a true excercise in what I call mathematics. For me it defines the do's and the don'ts. It's my source of hope, knowledge, faith and love.

Michelle, Michael-Alan and Daniel are my three kids. I guess one can imagine how happy they make me feel. They represent the only really important concern in my life.

I like football (soccer), table tennis, baseball etc. Running is also lots of fun. Constantly pushing my limits one step further. I need excercise to keep myself in balance.

Lately I'm into Salsa music and I spend much of my free time in the Salsa scene. I participate in the non-profit organisation Stichting Siempre Salsa. This year we have organized our first salsa marathon by which we collected funds for a charity in Cuba.