Davis High School in Mount Vernon, New York, and attended Harvard University, receiving a bachelor's degree in mathematics in 1956.

In 1958, he left ORO to take a position at a company called Technical Operations, where he helped build a research and development laboratory for military software projects.

After the merger, Warshall sat on the board of directors of ADR and managed a variety of projects and organizations.

He retired from ADR in 1982 and taught a weekly class in Biblical Hebrew at Temple Ahavat Achim in Gloucester, Massachusetts.

Because Warshall did not like sitting at a desk, he did much of his creative work in unconventional places such as on a sailboat in the Indian Ocean or in a Greek lemon orchard.