Pioneers of Soviet Computing's publication was made possible by support from numerous people in several countries. The project involved many trips to Kiev by the editor and translator, and overcoming some formidable distance, cultural, and language barriers. English speakers who are familiar with the Russian language know how easily sentences, phrases, and their meanings can be mistranslated. Yet getting past these roadblocks is a big reward in itself.

And as with any large internationally-based project, while the cultural and language faux pas were sometimes a cause for frustration, at other times they provided much needed comic relief: trying to shake hands with Ukrainian colleagues over a doorstep was frowned upon by them, as it is considered bad luck. They in turn chuckled at the typical American aversion to eating salo - a traditional Ukrainian delicacy. A particularly delightful break from the tedium of translation and editing was exchanging English and Russian idioms, proverbs, and explaining cultural peculiarities to one another.

Individuals on both sides of the Atlantic were instrumental in helping to see this project through to the end. In Kiev, Lev and Galina Malinovsky, Vera and Volodya Bigdan, and Tamara Malashok selflessly gave their office space, computer time, interpretation suggestions, and more importantly their friendship and collegiality. Academician Boris Paton, President of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, consistently gave this project a thumbs up. In Russia, Eduard Proidakov of PC Week did the same. In America, scores of people unwaveringly encouraged us to complete this project. David Grier at the IEEE Annals of the History of Computing was a pillar of encouragement. Peggy Kidwell of the National Museum of American History, Computers and Mathematics Collection, provided some wonderful photographs. Bob Seidel at the University of Minnesota, Andy White at Los Alamos Lab, and all of the eBook peer reviewers, John Impagliazzo, Janet Abbate, and Slava Gerovitch, deserve a huge thank you for their time and positive words, and for making this a better book. Thanks also go to Robert Teller for his comments and keen business sense, Don Meeker and Laura McNamara at Sandia Lab for cheering the project on, and Chad and Amy Kieffer for their web design skills. A special thanks goes to all those many colleauges who encouraged us to publish this book on the web in html and pdf formats: since the site's launch in July 2006, tens of thousands of visitors have come here so far, and the readership continues to grow. Finally, and most importantly, to our readers for helping to improve the site with your comments, and to those who have purchased Pioneers of Soviet Computing, thank you for making this book a genuine success.