Introduction to Computing

History of Computing

William Johnson William.Johnson@gpc.edu

Julia Benson-Slaughter Julia.Benson-Slaughter@gpc.edu

Chapter 1History of Computing

Chapter 1History of Computing

Before computers were developed First generation computing Second generation computing Third generation computing Fourth generation computing The current (fifth) generation and beyond.

Before the Industrial Revolution

The Renaissance was a time of great philosophical and scientific progress, including critical milestones in mathematics that would lead toward the invention of the computer.

Critical Mathematical Concepts

Boolean Algebra Published by George Boole in 1854 Clarifies the mathematical field of Boolean

algebra Forms the numerical basis for computer

hardware George Boole's contribution

Early Calculating Devices

Before approximately 1820 Basic calculating devices to support simple

mathematics Arithmetic Algebra

Devices were Mechanical in nature No data storage

Early Calculating Devices

Abacus Invented about 3000 BC Originated in either China or the Indus

River Valley area Discussion of the abacus Demonstration of an abacus (video)

Early Calculating Devices

Napier's Bones Device using lattice multiplication for

calculating products and quotients Mechanical, but not mechanized Napier's Bones: How They Work (video)

Early Calculating Devices

Slide Rule Invented by William Oughtred in 1622 Following up on Napier's work with both

logarithms & Napier's Bones Performs a variety of mathematical

calculations How to Use a Slide Rule (video)

Early Calculating Devices

The Rechenuhr (Calculating Clock) First mechanical calculating device Built by Wilhelm Schickard in 1623 Functioned accurately but had several

mechanical flaws and was never placed into full production

Early Calculating Devices Pascaline

Developed in 1643 by French mathematician Blaise Pascal

Mechanical device that could add and subtract (in other words, a basic calculator)

Pascal and his Calculator How the Pascaline Works (video)

Early Calculating Devices

Von Leibnitz “Stepped Reckoner” Built in 1673 by German mathematician Gottfried

Wilhelm von Leibnitz Inventor of differential & integral calculus

Calculating device improving on the Pascaline Could multiply as well as add and subtract (but

still couldn't divide).

The Industrial Revolution

The 1700s and early 1800s were a time of great political and social unrest (examples: the American and French Revolutions). As a result, mathematics and science took a back seat to other endeavors until the political and social climate settled down and the Industrial Revolution began early in the 19th century.

19th Century Computing Devices

Products of the Industrial Revolution Mechanical devices Limited data storage

Small quantities Clumsy methods

Design often outpaced available technology 19th century contributions to computing

Jacquard's “Loom” Invented by Joseph Jacquard between 1801-

1804 Built upon the work of Basile Bouchon, Jean

Falcon and Jacques de Vaucanson to create an automatic weaving loom.

Wove intricately patterned cloth based on instructions contained on punched cards.

The first programmable stored instruction machine actually built.

Jacquard Loom: Early Computer Programing (video)

Charles Babbage Charles Babbage can be considered the

single most important individual in the pre-20th century development of the computer.

Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge University

Co-founder of the Royal Astronomical Society

Cryptographer who broke Vignere's autokey cypher (thought to be unbreakable)

Inventor of the locomotive cow-catcher

Difference Engine Version 1: 1820-1830 Solved polynomial equations of the form

ax2+bx+c to an accuracy of six places Gear-driven machine All calculating was done with repeated

addition Difference Engine Simulator

Difference Engine Prototype consisting of 1/7 of the final

machine was built in 1832 Remainder was never completed

Image from the Science Museum via computerhistory.org

Analytical Engine Designed 1833-1842 Stored program machine to perform any

type of arithmetic calculation Numerous limitations prevented Babbage

from actually building it Politics, economics, personalities were as

much a factor as technology

Analytical Engine

Comprised of three main parts “Mill” for calculations “Store” for storing data Input/output device

Design corresponds in many ways to the basic architecture of the modern computer

Analytical Engine

Babbage describes the Analytical Engine in his autobiography

Machine has not been built to this day Plan28.org Has been established to build

the Analytical Engine by 2020 Watch John Graham-Cunningham's TEDx

talk on “The Greatest Machine that Never Was”

Difference Engine #2 Designed between 1847 and 1849 Improved upon the original Difference

Engine with a simpler design to achieve the same computing power

Again, not built during Babbage's lifetime Was finally built between 1985 and 2002

by the Science Museum of London, exactly to Babbage's original plans

Difference Engine #2 NPR story about Charles Babbage's

Difference Engine

Ada Lovelace

Augusta Ada Byron King, Countess of Lovelace and daughter of poet Lord Byron

Contemporary & colleague of Babbage Regarded as the first computer programmer

1843 translation & expansion of Luigi Menabrea's paper described the sequence of operations which the Analytical Engine should perform to carry out calculations

Hollerith Census Tabulator

Invented in 1890 by Herman Hollerith Machine for

sorting punched cards based on patterns formed by the holes

counting or tabulating data from these cards. Hollerith 1890 Census Tabulator

Hollerith Census Tabulator

Allowed completion of processing the 1890 census in one year (as opposed to eight years for the 1880 census)

Later used for accounting, sales analysis, statistical reporting, bookkeeping

Beginnings of IBM

Hollerith formed the Tabulating Machine Company in 1896.

In 1924 the Tabulating Machine Company became International Business Machines Corporation, aka IBM

Premier computing company through the 1980s

Classroom ActivityPrimitive Computing DevicesA number of primitive computing devices have been simulated with computer

programs:

Abacus

Napier's Bones

Virtual Slide Rule

Difference Engine

Experiment with each simulator to discover which types of arithmetic calculations that the device can handle. For each device, write a paragraph describing the calculations you were able to complete, with examples of each type. What calculations could all the devices handle? Were there any calculations that no device could handle, and if so what?

Take a screenshot of each device solving a specific arithmetic problem. Add a description of the problem and how successful you were at solving it with that device. Put each screenshot in your document along with the paragraph about the device.

Which device was the easiest to use? Which was the most difficult?

The 1930s and World War II Provided the real push for the invention of

the modern-day computer War, defense, and financial incentives were

powerful motivation Cryptography and calculation were the

primary purposes for developing calculating machines.

The Turing Machine

Described in a paper published by Alan Turing in 1936

Concept that formed a theoretical basis for the modern-day computer a hypothetical construct merging

the idea of a machine, the action of the mind, logical instruction

Intended to model any computation possible with no limitations on data

The Turing Machine

A Turing Machine Overview (video) Lego Turing Machine (video) Simulated Turing Machine (JavaScript

application)

Atanasoff-Berry Computer Developed in 1939-40 by Iowa State

University Professor John Atanasoff and Clifford Berry, one of his graduate students.

Considered the first (partially) electronic digital computer. Fully electronic for data storage & calculation

via ~300 vacuum tubes Mechanical switches for selecting operations Contained memory, but nothing that we would

consider a CPU

Atanasoff-Berry Computer

Separated data storage from data processing via different hardware components

Used binary (base-2) numbers rather than decimal.

No stored-program capability Had to be manually controlled to run

programs Replica of the original ABC (video)

The Z Family of Computers

Developed by German Konrad Zuse Worked alone with little knowledge of

concurrent developments in Great Britain & the United States

Z Series evolved between 1935 and 1948

Z1 Computer

Built between 1936 & 1938 Considered first programmable binary

computing machine Used Boolean logic Handled binary floating point (real) numbers

Strictly mechanical except for electrical motor for synchronizing calculations

Panoramic view of reconstructed Z1 Simulation of the Z1 Adder

Z3 Computer Built by Zuse in 1941 as a top-secret

military project Implemented many improvements over

Z1 Stored-program, fully programmable machine Replaced most mechanical parts with

electromechanical relays Based on a binary floating-point number and

switching system. Reconstruction of the Z3 (video) Z3 Simulation (in German) Z3 Adder Simulation (in German)

Enigma vs. Bombe Electromechanical encryption/decryption

devices for Morse code radio telegraphy (data transmission) Enigma was the German machine Bombe was the British machine

How Enigma works Watch the Bombe in action

Lorenz Cipher & Colossus

Lorenz cipher was used by the German Tunny machine to encrypt military teleprinter (wired) transmissions using International Telegraphy Alphabet No. 2 instead of Morse code

Cryptanalysis project ran in parallel with the Enigma/Bombe project

Colossus was the British machine developed to decipher this encryption.

The Significance of Colossus

If not for the secrecy surrounding Colossus, it would be considered the first large-scale electronic computer. Eight of the ten machines were destroyed

soon after the war's end. The remaining two were destroyed a decade

later. Project information was not declassified until

1975.

MARK I computer Developed in 1943-1944 in a joint

IBM/Harvard University effort led by Howard Aiken.

Contained 760,000 electronic parts 500 miles of wiring 3000 electromechanical relays for switches

Weighed five tons & occupied a whole building on Harvard campus

Considered the world's first programmable computer until the existence of Colossus became known.

MARK I computer

Based on the then-current generation of IBM tabulating machines (successors of Hollerith's machine)

Because of the switches, the MARK I is not considered an electronic computer

Could handle addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, as well as logarithmic & trigonometric calculations

Mark I Computer (video)

The First Computer “Bug” A small moth trapped in one of the

electromechanical switches in the MARK II Found by a team led by Navy Lieutenant

Grace Murray Hopper, logged on September 19,1945 at 15:45 hours

ENIAC Developed by Presper Eckert and

John Mauchly in 1946. First fully electronic computer

No electromechanical switches No moving parts

Based on vacuum tube technology to replace electromechanical relays.

Contained 18,000 vacuum tubes 80,000 resistors/capacitors

ENIAC Weighed 30 tons & took up over 15000

square feet of space Used decimal rather than binary numbers Did not store information

Programming involved completely rewiring the machine for each job that it was to perform

ENIAC Simulation ENIAC: The First Computer (video)

The ENIAC Programmers Six women became the first ENIAC

programmers in 1945 Kathleen McNulty, Jean Bartik, Frances

“Betty” Holberton, Marlyn Meltzer, Frances Spence and Ruth Teitelbaum

Only individuals to manually program ENIAC before it became a stored-program version

Interview with Jean Bartik (video) The Women of ENIAC from the IEEE

Annals of the History of Computing

EDVAC Successor to ENIAC

developed by Eckert & Mauchly between 1944 & 1949

Improved on ENIAC by Adding stored program

capability using design created by John von Neumann in 1944

Using binary numbers instead of decimal numbers

Machine Language

Instructions telling the computer what to do

Written as a sequence of patterns using the symbols 0 and 1

Each pattern represented a specific instruction or value

UNIVAC I

Completed in 1951 by Eckert & Mauchly First commercially available computer First one was sold to the Census Bureau for

$300,000 Successfully predicted the outcome of the

1952 presidential election using a program written by Grace Murray Hopper

Remington-Rand Presents the UNIVAC (video)

Assembly Language Created by Grace Murray Hopper in 1952 Used mnemonics (abbreviations) to represent

the bit patterns of 0s and 1s that told the computer what to do. produced the first programming language translator to translate assembly language into machine language (0s and 1s) for programming.

FORTRAN Introduced in 1956 FORTRAN is short for FORmula

TRANslator First high level programming language,

using English-like words & statement structure

Developed by a team of scientists at IBM led by John Backus for science and engineering applications

FORTRAN Designed for “number crunching" and

complex calculations Current version is Fortran 2008

Tenth generation of the language

The Transistor

Began to replace the vacuum tube in the late 1950s (solid-state devices). Provided increased reliability and speed as well as decreased size of computers.

1960

Introduction of COBOL (COmmon Business Oriented Language), first business oriented high level language. Introduction of LISP (LISt Processing language) for artificial intelligence applications.

1962

Development of SABRE, the first airline passenger reservation system, in a joint IBM/American Airlines effort.

Critical Mathematical Concepts

Logarithms First described by John Napier in 1614 in

Mirifici Logarithmorum Canonis Descriptio (Description of the Marvelous Canon of Logarithms)

http://history-computer.com/CalculatingTools/logarythms.html

1964 BASIC (Basic All-purpose Symbolic

Instruction Code) introduced as an easy-to-learn programming language. PL/I (Programming Language/I) introduced as a synthesis of the best of FORTRAN and COBOL (and is a huge and extremely complex language as a result).

1965

Introduction of the integrated circuit (IC) — transistors on a chip to replace an entire circuit board of separate transistors wired together to perform some function. Again, increased reliability and speed of computers while decreasing size.

1969 Development of the UNIX operating system

at Bell Laboratories

1970 The Department of Defense creates

ARPANET, the precursor to the Internet, by connecting together four computers.

They were located in the respective computer research labs of UCLA (Honeywell DDP 516 computer), Stanford Research Institute (SDS-940 computer), UC Santa Barbara (IBM 360/75), and the University of Utah (DEC PDP-10).

1971 Introduction of the first microprocessor, the

Intel 4004, containing an entire CPU on a chip.

Led to supercomputers and PCs (both ends of the computing spectrum!).

Pascal

Introduced in 1971 First strongly typed programming

language Developed by Nicolas Wirth as a tool for

teaching programming with good style & technique

1973 Decision by Judge Earl Richard Larson, in

the lawsuit Honeywell vs. Sperry Rand, that the patent issued for the ENIAC computer was invalid, and that the ABC invented by John Atanasoff was the first electronic digital computer.

1974 The C programming language was

developed at Bell Labs by Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie, a couple of researchers just playing around with a spare computer.

C is considered to be a middle-level language, with most features of high level languages but also the fine control of machine that assembly language gives.

The Altair 8080

The first personal computer Introduced in kit form in 1975

Intel 8080 processor with 256 bytes of RAM More information about the Altair 8080

Apple Computer, Inc Started in 1977 by Steve Jobs and Steve

Wozniak Introduced the Apple I

First off-the-shelf personal computer.

FORTRAN 77

Standardization completed in 1977 First version of Fortran to be considered a

structured programming language

Apple Computer, Inc Started in 1977 by Steve Jobs and Steve

Wozniak Introduced the Apple I

First off-the-shelf personal computer.

Apple II Introduced in 1978 First personal computer with secondary

storage capability 5 1/4” floppy disk drive 360 kilobytes of storage per disk

VisiCalc

Introduced in 1978 First spreadsheet package Developed by Dan Bricklin and Bob

Frankston

1980 Smalltalk, the first object-oriented language,

invented at Xerox PARC

1981

The first IBM PC introduced

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f1/Ibm_pc_5150.jpg/647px-Ibm_pc_5150.jpg

1982 dBASE, the first database program for

personal computers, introduced.

1986 Pixar is founded:

http://www.pixar.com/about/Our-Story

1990

Tim Berners-Lee develops HyperText Markup Language, providing the foundation for the development of the World Wide Web

Microsoft releases the first stable & commercially successful version of Windows, Windows 3.0

1991 Introduction of the Linux operating system,

a UNIX-derived program initially developed by Linus Torvalds

1994

Tim Berners-Lee invents Mosaic, the first "web browser"

Intel releases the first Pentium microprocessor CPU

1995

Introduction of the Java programming language by software architect, James Gosling

Resources

Bit by Bit Visual Journey Through Computing History History of Computers Timeline of Computer History