Ludwig Föppl

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Karl Ludwig Föppl (born February 27, 1887 in Leipzig , † May 13, 1976 in Munich ) was a German university professor , member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and the Circolo Matematico di Palermo . During the First World War he worked as a cryptanalyst .

Life

Ludwig was the son of August Föppl , a German structural engineer and university professor and brother-in-law of the physicist Ludwig Prandtl . He did his doctorate in Göttingen with David Hilbert and completed his habilitation in Würzburg in 1914 ( rotating egg on a horizontal surface ). During World War I he worked as a cryptanalyst for a German radio operator on the Western Front and in 1915 was able to use the Gronsfeld cipher used by the security associations of the British Royal Navy and, in the further course of the war, the Allied Fleet Code, the Allied Fleet Signal Book, the Break French naval signal book and the French standard "chgt" procedure .

In 1920 he became a full professor at the TH Dresden . In 1922 he followed his father as a professor at the Technical University of Munich (today: Technical University of Munich ). From 1925 until his retirement in 1955 he was head of the “mechanical-technical laboratory”. After the time of National Socialism , Föppl was considered a Nazi opponent; he could therefore be appointed rector of the university from 1947 to 1948 . From 1940 he was a full member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences .

Fonts

He was the editor of the later editions of the lectures on technical mechanics of his father August Föppl (with Otto Föppl) and co-author of Drang und Zwang .

  • with Ernst Mönch: Practical Tension Optics, 3rd edition, Springer Verlag 1972
  • Elementary mechanics from a higher point of view, Oldenbourg 1959
  • with Heinz Neuber: Strength theory by means of stress optics, Oldenbourg 1935
  • The strict solution for rolling friction, Munich, Leibniz-Verlag 1947
  • with Gerhard Sonntag: Tables and tables on strength theory, Oldenbourg 1951

literature

  • Hilmar-Detlef Brueckner: Germany's First Cryptanalysis on the Western Front - Decrypting British and French Naval ciphers in World War I . Cryptologia , Vol. 29, No. 1, January 2005, pp. 1-22.
  • Martin Samuels: Ludwig Föppl - A Bavarian cryptanalyst on the Western front . Cryptologia, 2016. doi : 10.1080 / 01611194.2015.1084960

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Source: Historical archive of the Technical University of Munich
  2. ↑ Codes & Codebreakers In World War I. In: Greg Goebel: Codes, Ciphers, & Codebreaking.
  3. ↑ Hilmar-Detlef Brueckner: Germany's First Cryptanalysis on the Western Front - Decrypting British and French Naval ciphers in World War I . Cryptologia. Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. Taylor & Francis, Philadelphia PA 29.2005,1 (January), pp. 1-22. ISSN  0161-1194 .
  4. ↑ Föppl, Ludwig (1887-1976). on the website of the Chair of Materials Science and Mechanics of the Technical University of Munich
  5. ^ Leon W. Wells: Ein Sohn Job , Munich: C. Hanser 1963, p. 315
personal data
SURNAME Föppl, Ludwig
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Föppl, Karl Ludwig (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German mechanical engineer, rector of the Technical University of Munich, cryptologist
DATE OF BIRTH February 27, 1887
PLACE OF BIRTH Leipzig
DATE OF DEATH May 13, 1976
Place of death Munich