A sound recording of an interview conducted by Dr. Anne Millar with Don Cowan, Distinguished Professor Emeritus in the Cheriton School of Computer Science at the University of Waterloo, for the Oral History Hub pilot project. The interview includes discussions about Cowan's family background, their decision to come to Waterloo and the path that brought them here, as well as their thoughts about the institution and where it will be at 100 years old, in 2057. Additional topics include computer science, IBM, Computer Science Days, math contests, WATFOR, WATFIV, MicroWAT, Centre for Education in Mathematics and Computing, intellectual property, startups, co-op, Wes Graham, Ralph Stanton, Doug Wright, Ken Fryer, Paul Dirksen, Paul Cress, and Pat Fisher. The interview was conducted virtually from Waterloo, Ontario. File also contains a transcript of the interview.

Dr. Donald (Don) Cowan, Department of Applied Analysis and Computer Science.

File consists of a photocopy of a paper by D.D. Cowan and J.W. Graham, published in SIGPLAN Notices in July, 1970 (pp. 25-36).

A typed copy of a presentation titled, "Views on the IIASA programme in computer communications and a review of some Canadian projects" by Donald Cowan, A.R. Kaye and J.L. Hanna delivered at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Schloss Laxenburg, Austria between October 21-25, 1974.

A book titled, "Waterloo 6809 assembler: tutorial and reference manual" by Donald Cowan and M.J. Shaw. The book was published as part of the "Series in Computer Science and Computer Applications."

A copy of an article titled, "Some unique extremal graphs" by Donald Cowan, V.G. Cerf, R.C. Mullin, and Ralph G. Stanton. The article was published in Ars Combinatoria, volume 1, June 1976, pages 119-157.

A copy of an article titled, "Some results on tree numbers" by Donald Cowan, Ralph G. Stanton and L.O. James. The article was published in the Proceedings of the Second Louisiana Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory and Computing, March 8-11, 1971, pages 317-330.

Two copies of an article titled, "Some results on path numbers" by Donald Cowan, Ralph G. Stanton, and L.O. James. One copy is a final draft and the other is an offprint. The article was published in the Proceedings of the First Louisiana Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory, and Computing, 1970, pages 112-135.

A publication titled, "Solutions to the problems in : an introduction to COBOL with WATBOL" by Donald Cowan, J.A. Derosie, V.J. Watts, and T.A. Wilkinson. The publication is one hundred and sixteen pages.

A copy of an article titled, "A problem in coding theory" by Donald Cowan, L.O. James and Ralph G. Stanton. The article was published in the Proceedings of the First Louisiana Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory and Computing, March 1970, pages 167-180.

Two copies of a report titled, "On the concept of modules in programming systems" by Donald Cowan as well as C.J. Lucena and A. von Staa (Departamento de Informática, Pontifícia Universidade Católica, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil). The report was published by the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Waterloo as Research Report CS-76-05 in January 1976. The report is thirty-nine pages.

Two copies of an article titled, "Note on a "square" functional equation" by Donald Cowan and Ralph G. Stanton. The article was published in SIAM Review, volume 12 (number 2), pages 277-279.

A copy of an article titled, "A network operating system for interconnected LANs with heterogeneous data-link layers" by Donald Cowan, T.M. Stepien, and R.G. Veitch. The article was reprinted by the Computer Society Press Reprint from the Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Local Computer Networks, October 10-12, 1988, pages 99-105.

A copy of an article titled, "Minimal sequences with permutation subsequences" by Donald Cowan, Ralph G. Stanton and J.A. Bates. The article was published in the Congressus Numerantium VIII Proceedings of the Fourth Southeastern Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory, and Computing March 5-8, 1973, pages 151-162.

A manual titled, "Instructor's manual to accompany the textbook: an introduction to COBOL with WATBOL - a structured programming approach" by Donald Cowan and B. J. Rowe. The text is one hundred and sixteen pages.

Three copies of an article titled, "Future directions in data communications for post-secondary education" by Donald Cowan. The article was published in CIPS Review, May/June 1988, pages 10-11.

A copy of an article titled, "Formal structure for specifying the content and quality of the electronic health record" by H. Dominic Covvey, David Zitner, Daniel M. Berry, Donald Cowan, and Michael Shepherd. This article was likely a conference paper presented at the 11th IEEE International Conference on Requirements Engineering held in Monterey Bay, California between September 8-12, 2003.

A manual titled, "File processing with COBOL/WATBOL: part 2" by Donald Cowan, R.H. Cooper, Paul H. Dirksen, and James Wesley Graham. According to the introduction "the purpose of this text was to introduce some of the most common file-processing techniques, and to illustrate their implementation using the COBOL language." The manual is printed in two parts. Part 2 covers in detail the applications-oriented subjects such as sorting, file maintenance and report generation. Part 2 is one hundred and forty-two pages.

A manual titled, "File processing with COBOL/WATBOL: part 1, by Donald Cowan, R.H. Cooper, Paul H. Dirksen, and James Wesley Graham. According to the introduction "the purpose of this text was to introduce some of the most common file-processing techniques, and to illustrate their implementation using the COBOL language." The manual is printed in two parts. Part 1 introduces COBOL-oriented concepts and is one hundred and twenty-two pages.

A copy of an article titled, "The efficient representation of inverted lists," by Donald Cowan, James Wesley Graham, and James W. Welch. The article was published in Congressus Numerantium 17, Proceedings of the Seventh Southeastern Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory, and Computing, February 9-12, 1976, pages 257-272.

A copy of an article titled, "Diversity, accessibility and adaptability: data communication need for higher education, the University of Waterloo experience," by Donald Cowan, S.L. Fenton, A. Pittman, and T.M. Stepien. The report was reprinted from IEEE Communications Society, IEEE International Conference on Communications, June 12-15, 1988, pages 1576-1580.

A report titled, "The development proposal - the first step in software system construction," by Donald Cowan and A.Von Staa (Departamento de Informática, Pontifícia Universidade Católica, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil). The report was published by the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Waterloo as Research Report CS-78-31 in June 1978. The cover page of the report includes a note that the research was supported in part by Canadian National Research Council Grant A2655. The report is seventy-six pages.

A copy of an article titled, "Design characteristics of the WATFOR compiler," by Donald Cowan and James Wesley Graham. The article was published in SIGPLAN Notices, volume 5 (number 7), pages 25-36.

A copy of an article titled, "A data-directed approach to program construction," by Donald Cowan and C.J.P. Lucena (Departamento de Informática, Pontifícia Universidade Católica, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil). This cover page of the article notes that the research was supported by Canadian National Research Grant A2655. The article appears to be published by the Faculty of Mathematics, University of Waterloo.

A copy of an article titled, "Computer networks : technology boon/moral and legal nightmare," by Donald Cowan. The article is twenty-four pages.

A report titled, "Computer networks and generalized Moore graphs," by Donald Cowan, V.G. Cerf, R.C. Mullin, R.G. Stanton. This report was published as External Report 15 by the Computer Communications Network Group (CCNG) at the University of Waterloo. The report was also published in an an offprint from Proceedings of the Third Manitoba Conference on Numerical Mathematics, October 3-6, 1973, pages 379-398.

Two copies of an article titled, "The challenges of teaching computer science by distance education," by V. Arnie Dyck, James P. Black, Donald Cowan, and Shirley L. Fenton. This article was published in the ICDE Bulletin, volume 18, pages 26-27.

Three copies of an article titled, "Batch compilers for student programs on the PDP-11," by Donald Cowan, P.H. Dirksen, J.W. Graham, J.W. Welch, and T. Wilkinson. This article was published in the Proceedings of the Digital Equipment Computer Users Society, May 1976, pages 919-921.

Copies of three manuscripts that were presented at the 9th Canadian DECUS Symposium in Toronto, Ontario in January 1976. Includes:

• 1. Cowan, D.D., P.H. Dirksen, J.W. Graham and J.W. Welch. Development of educational software using the DEC PDP-11. 17 pages.

• 2. Cowan, D.D., Jack Schueler and J.W. Welch. Debugging aids for the PDP-11. 5 pages.

A photocopy of a proof for an article titled, "Networks for education at the University of Waterloo" by Donald Cowan, S. Fenton, James Wesley Graham, and T.M. Stepien. The article was published in Computer Networks and ISDN Systems, volume 15, (issue 5), pages 313-327, in October 1988.

A typed manuscript titled, "The growth of network cost as a function of network size," by V.G. Cerf, D.D. Cowan, R.C. Mullin, and R.G. Stanton. The manuscript is thirty-seven pages.

A typed manuscript titled, "The generalized Petersen graph" written by V.G. Cerf, D.D. Cowan, R.C. Mullin, and R.G. Stanton in June 1973.

Three copies of a typed draft manuscript titled, "Economics of integration in communications and data processing" by Donald Cowan and L. Waverman. Also includes notes, and related items. This paper was later published in Policy Considerations with Respect to Computer Utilities, Tele Commission Study, Department of Communications, Government of Canada, April 1971.

A typed draft manuscript titled, "Economics of integration in communications and data processing" by Donald Cowan and L. Waverman. The manuscript is sixty-three pages. Also includes a nine page typed script or prompt for a presentation of the same name. This paper was later published in Policy Considerations with Respect to Computer Utilities, Tele Commission Study, Department of Communications, Government of Canada, April 1971.

Two typed copies of a manuscript titled, "A discussion of the concept of modules in programming systems" by Donald Cowan as well as C.J. Lucena and A. von Staa, Departamento de Informática, Pontifícia Universidade Católica, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Both copies (original and photocopy) of the manuscript are twelve pages.

Two copies of a typed manuscript titled, "Counting algorithms for connected labelled graphs" by Donald Cowan, R.C. Mullin, and Ralph G. Stanton. The manuscript is twelve pages. This paper was presented at the sixth Southeastern Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory, and Computing held at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Florida between February 17-20, 1975. This paper was subsequently published in the Proceedings of the sixth Southeastern Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory, and Computing, pages 219-231. Also includes correspondence related to the submission of the paper to the conference.

Six typed manuscripts of unpublished papers regarding the construction of generalized Moore graphs by Donald Cowan, V.G. Cerf, R.C. Mullin, and Ralph G. Stanton including:

• 1. Cerf, V.G., D.D. Cowan, R.C. Mullin and R.G. Stanton. Construction of the Generalized Moore Graph on 14 vertices. 16 pages.

• 2. Cerf, V.G., D.D. Cowan, R.C. Mullin and R.G. Stanton. Construction of the Generalized Moore Graph on 16 vertices. 21 pages.

• 3. Cerf, V.G., D.D. Cowan, R.C. Mullin and R.G. Stanton. Construction of the Generalized Moore Graph on 18 vertices. 28 pages.

• 4. Cerf, V.G., D.D. Cowan, R.C. Mullin and R.G. Stanton. Construction of the Generalized Moore Graph on 20 vertices. 13 pages.

• 5. Cerf, V.G., D.D. Cowan, R.C. Mullin and R.G. Stanton. Construction of the Generalized Moore Graph on 24 vertices. 12 pages.

• 6. Cerf, V.G., D.D. Cowan, R.C. Mullin and R.G. Stanton. Construction of the Generalized Moore Graph on 26 vertices. 51 pages.

A typed manuscript titled, "An always convergent method for determining the zeros of polynomials" by Gerald Berman and Donald Cowan. The manuscript is twenty-four pages. This paper was presented at the Fifth National Conference of the Computer Society of Canada in May 1966.

Two original typed copies of a manuscript titled, "The allocation and scheduling of computer resources" by Donald Cowan and James Wesley Graham. The manuscript is twenty-four pages.

Two copies of a manuscript titled, "A study of the package software industry in Canada: a report submitted to the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce" by Donald Cowan and James Wesley Graham in August 1983. Both copies are sixty-eight pages.

Two typed manuscripts titled, "Some thoughts on the construction of programs - a data-directed approach" by Donald Cowan and Carlos J. P. Lucena, Departamento de Informática, Pontifícia Universidade Católica, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. One manuscript is a draft (photocopy) with annotations and is seventeen pages. The second manuscript is a master copy (photocopy) and is five pages.

A typed manuscript (final draft, photocopy) titled, "Sequential optimization methods for determining the zeros of polynomials" by Gerald Berman and Donald D. Cowan. The manuscript is twenty-five pages. This paper was presented at the Fifth National Conference of the Computer Society of Canada in May 1966.

A typed manuscript titled, "A partial census of trivalent generalized Moore graphs" by V.G. Cerf, Donald Cowan, R.C. Mullin, and R.G. Stanton. The manuscript is one hundred and four pages. Also includes a photocopy of the same article, possibly from the source of publication. This photocopy is twenty-seven pages.

A report titled, "CANDU reactor transfer functions" by Donald Cowan. The report is fifty-three pages and contains the following imprint: Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, Nuclear Power Plant Division, TDSI - 27, Toronto, Ontario. According to the introduction, the "context of this report is the mathematical derivation of these transfer functions and the presentation of the open-loop amplitude and phase response for different reactor power levels." In 1960, Donald Cowan worked as a Research Assistant at Atomic Energy of Canada Limited. The report is stamped: "not for publication."