Lawrence (Larry) W. Dowdy
From 1978-81, Dr. Dowdy was an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at
the University of Maryland at College Park.
From 1981-2014, he was a faculty member at Vanderbilt
University in the Department of
Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. In 1987-88, he spent a
sabbatical year at the Institut für Informatik
at the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg,
In the past, Professor Dowdy served a member of the
IFIP Working Group 7.3, an international group of researchers in the area of
performance measurement and modeling of computer systems. Dr. Dowdy also
served as the Chair of SIGMETRICS and has served as the senior editor of the
"Performance Supplement" project, a joint project sponsored by ACM SIGMETRICS and the Computer Measurement Group
(CMG). He has co-authored three books, P.S. to Operating Systems,
Capacity Planning and
Performance Modeling, and Performance by Design
published by Prentice Hall, and has received research, teaching, and
administrative awards. Professor Dowdy has taught many courses, primarily
in the areas of operating systems and performance analysis. He has also
been involved in the One Laptop Per Child initiative and with Engineers Without Borders. In 2012, he spent three months in South
America (blog). In 2014, Larry retired from Vanderbilt University
as an emeritus faculty member.
Larry and his wife, Sharon, are proud of their children, David and Erin, of their son-in-law, Matt, and of their three grandchildren, Chessie, Ethan, and Owen.