aiSee is based on the graph layout tool VCG (Visualization of Compiler Graphs). The work on VCG started as a diploma thesis written by Iris Lemke at Saarland University in 1991. The goal was to develop a tool that supports the understanding of the internal data structures of a compiler.
Soon it became clear that such a graph layout tool was very useful in the context of compiler construction, e.g, for the debugging of compilers. The Department for Programming Languages and Compiler Construction at Saarland University decided to increase the efforts in the graph layout area, and VCG was redesigned, widely extended and reimplemented.
The VCG tool won the Graph Visualization Competition in Princeton (in the category ``directed graphs'') in 1994 and in Passau in 1995 (in the category A and honorably mentioned in category B). The key author of the VCG tool, Dr.-Ing. Georg Sander, received the GI-Dissertationspreis in 1997 (National Award, German Computer Science Society) for his work on ``Visualisierungstechniken für den Compilerbau''.
In January 2000, AbsInt Angewandte Informatik GmbH licensed the non-public version of VCG from the Saarland University for commercial usage.
Foremost, we would like to thank the key author Dr.-Ing. Georg Sander for the outstanding development. We would like to thank Iris Lemke, Martin Sicks, Stephan Thesing, Marc Langenbach, Christian Ferdinand, Judith Engelkamp and Amy S. Bryant who contributed in various stages to aiSee and/or its documentation, Gerhard Korz and Prof. Dr. Maximilian Herberger who were very supportive and patient during the license negotiations, Prof. Dr. Reinhard Wilhelm who provided the environment to develop VCG at his chair at Saarland University, the COMPARE group who had the pleasure and pain to work with early versions of VCG, and the many VCG users who provided valuable feedback.