An Overview of the History of Computing

An Overview of the History of Computing

1642

Blaise Pascal invents a mechanical adder ("Pascaline").

1801

Joseph Jacquard invents a loom controlled by punched cards.

1811

Luddites (after Edward "Ned" Ludd) break into their former factories and mills, destroying machines.

1821

Charles Babbage (1792-1871) proposes the Difference Engine [which AEOnline confuses with the Analytical Engine], a complex mechanical calculator for solving polynomial equations.

1834-35

Babbage designs the Analytical Engine.

1842-43

Ada, Countess of Lovelace (1815-1852), translates "Observations on Mr. Babbage's Analytical Engine" (with her "Notes").

1854

George Boole develops the logical algebra that will underlie computer logic.

1887

Herman Hollerith invents a sorting and tabulating machine to solve the 1880 U.S. census problem, and founds the Tabulating Machine Company (later, International Business Machines).

1932

Vannevar Bush completes the Differential Analyzer, an analog computer (mechanical calculator) which could solve calculus problems. (See Bush's 1945 article As We May Think.)

1936

Alan Turing publishes "On Computable Numbers," which lays the theoretical groundwork for computer science.

1936-1941

Konrad Zuse (b. 1910; see also Jurgen Schmidhuber's page on Zuse and Zuse internet archive), with assistance from Helmut Schreyer, builds a general-purpose computer using binary arithmetic and mechanical storage.

1938   Z1 -- uses mechanical switches, keyboard input

1939   Z2 -- uses electro-magnetic relays, punched film input

1941   Z3 -- first operational fully programmable computer
  See Zuse's own description of the development of the Z1, Z2, and Z3.

1937-41

John V. Atanasoff at Iowa State University, assisted by Clifford Berry, builds the Atanasoff-Berry Computer (ABC), a special-purpose machine using vacuum tubes to find solutions to systems of linear equations.

1936-43

Howard H. Aiken of Harvard (with a grant from IBM) builds a general-purpose computer, the Harvard Mark I, using electro-magnetic relays.

1943

Alan Turing and other British scientists, mathematicians, and engineers working at Bletchly Park build the first electronic computer, the Colossus, designed for code-breaking, using 2000 vacuum tubes.

1943-46

John Mauchley and J. Presper Eckert of the Moore School of Engineering (PA) design and build the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC), a general-purpose electronic computer with 18,000 vacuum tubes. (For more detailed information, see The ENIAC Story.)

1945

John von Neumann spends two days with the ENIAC team and writes a proposal for a stored-program computer, the EDVAC.

1947

J. Bardeen, W.H. Brattain and Wm. Shockley of Bell Telephone Labs invent the transistor, a high-speed electronic switch.

1948

The Manchester Mark 1 ("Baby"), the first stored program computer, is completed by a team led by Freddie Williams and Tom Kilburn

1949

EDSAC, Cambridge's stored program computer, is completed by a team led by Maurice Wilkes.

1946-1952

EDVAC, the "first" (conceptually) stored program computer, is built.

1954

Mauchley and Eckert sell the Univac I, the first commercial computer, to General Electric.

1959

Jack Kilby of Texas Instruments and Robert Noyce of Fairchild independently invent the integrated circuit (IC), combining many transistors an a silicon chip.

1961

Fairchild markets the first commercial IC.

1969

Ted Hoff (1937-) of Intel invents the microprocessor (the 4004), placing the entire CPU of a computer on a single chip.

1971

The Intel 4004 is used in an electronic calculator.

Intel 4004 vs. Pentium Pro

Transistors	2300	5.5 million
Die size	12 mm2	196 mm2
Transistor size	10 microns	0.35 microns
Clock speed	750 kHz	200 Mhz
MIPS rating	0.06 (est.)	440
Memory capacity	4 KB	64 GB
Package size	16 pins	387 pins

Source: Linley Gwennap, "Birth of a Chip," BYTE, Dec. 1996, p. 78.

 

Moore's Law
as seen in Intel chips

Year	Chip	Transistors
1971	4004	2300
1974	8080	6000
1978	8086	29,000
1982	80286	134,000
1985	386DX	275,000
1989	486	1,200,000
1993	Pentium	3,100,000
1995	Pentium Pro	5,500,000*

^*for CPU, excluding cache
Source: BYTE, Dec. 1996, p. 82

 Organize your knowledge of the history of computing by filling in the following grid:

Name of Developer and Computer	Year(s)	Technology	Number System	Programmability	Comments
Babbage's Analytical Engine	1834 - 35	steam and gears			Not completed
Atanasoff and Berry's ABC	1939 -		decimal
Zuse's Z2 and Z3	Z2: 1938 Z3: 1941				Z3: the first operational fully programmable digital computer
Aiken's Harvard Mark I (IBM ASCC)	1936 - 1943				"first true working computer" according to Decker and Hirschfield (?)
Turing et al. Colossus	1943	electronic (vacuum tubes)	?	single-purpose (code breaking)	first operational electronic computer
Mauchley and Eckert's ENIAC	1943 - 46
Ted Hoff's Intel 4004 microprocessor	1971	large-scale integration (LSI)			first microprocessor; first used in a calculator

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Related Resources

The History of Computing (Department of Computer Science at Virginia Tech)
A Brief History of Computers and Networks
Global Networking: a Timeline --- view the history of computing in a broader historical context
Babbage printer finally runs (BBC News, 2000 April 13)
John W. Mauchly and the Development of the ENIAC Computer: An Exhibition in the Department of Special Collections, Van Pelt Library, University of Pennsylvania -- extensive ENIAC documentation
History of Computing Information (U.S. Army Research Lab) -- mostly ENIAC-related material
Article on the 50th anniversary of EDSAC (BBC News, 1999 Apr 15)
World's smallest transistor (BBC News, 1999 Nov 19)
A History of Information Technology and Systemshttp://www.tcf.ua.edu/AZ/
History of Computers