[1] Williams received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in chemical engineering from the Pennsylvania State University, and another M.S.
In World War II, Williams served in the US Air Force as navigator in a B-24, was awarded the Air Medal with two oak leaf clusters, and retired with the rank of captain in 1956.
[3] Williams was president of the American Automatic Control Council (AACC) from 1965 to 1967; of the Instrument Society of America (ISA) in 1969; of the American Federation for Information Processing Societies (AFIPS) from 1976 to 1978; and first chairman of the IFAC/IFIP Task Force on Architectures for Integrating Manufacturing Activities and Enterprises from 1990 to 1996.
In 1976 Williams was awarded the Sir Harold Hartley Silver Medal by the Institute of Measurement and Control in London, England, and the A. F. Sperry Founder Award Gold Medal by the Instrument Society of America in 1990.
Williams wrote and edited about 50 books[4] and over 400 articles and papers in the fields from chemical engineering (process dynamics) to computer science (industrial computer control, Computer-integrated manufacturing) and the emerging field of Enterprise Architecture.