What is a computer

As humans we always build tools to help accomplish our problems

o Hammer, printing press, tractor
o All these inventions help us with manual work
o People begin to wonder if a machine can be design like the thinking work that we do(like
solving equations, tracking the stars in the sky).
o Rather than removing or manipulating physical things, like stones, dirt
o These machines would need to be designed to manipulate information
- The earliest computer is made from wood and metal – with mechanical levers and gears
- Then started to use electrical components
- These early computers are large and really slow
- Computers that is a size of a room might take hours just to solve a simple math probles
- Computers started out as basic calculators
o Before was awesome at that time
o They were only manipulating numbers back then

Characteristics of computers
1. Responds to a specific set of instructions: A computer processes input through a set of instructions known
as a program. These instructions are usually clear and well-defined, meaning the computer knows exactly how
to interpret and act on them.
2. Executes a pre-recorded list of instructions: Computers follow a sequence of steps written in a program.
Once given the instructions, the computer can automatically execute them in order, without needing human
intervention.
3. Quickly stores and retrieves large amounts of data: Computers have the ability to handle vast amounts of
data efficiently. They can store data in their memory (both temporary and permanent) and retrieve it quickly
when needed.

Human Computers
Today, the work is done by computers
Not too long ago computers were people
Math wizard – people with natural knowledge with numbers
But much of their contributions to the field of computer science were go unnoticed during their lifetime
because they were women
- Computing capabilities are opened to women, not just because they were skilled
o Mass production is dependent on their labor for their cheaper labor
- These human computers were integral in the war effort
- To accurately shoot the artillery shell depending on the number of factors (angle of fire, range to
target, wind speed and weather conditions)
- Without these computers before, the soldier could not be expected to do the correct math so they
depended on firing tables
 - Firing tables – sets of precalculated trajectories that the soldier could reference
o So, they could quickly fire their target given almost any circumstance
o Each table comprises of thousands of trajectories
o Each one hand calculated by human computers

Tally sticks
- Tally sticks were a form of receipt for government income which originated in the middle ages (17 th
century)
- Physical/visual way of giving people a receipt
o Paid money into the king
- How?
o A piece of wood would be created, then split it
o One part would be kept for someone who paid the money, and the one paid in to
o Created in two ways
 There could be notches – like grading on how much money have been paid
 A writing on the side as well
- Remnant from the medieval period where people need receipt on their paid money and they cant
read or write – handled usually by clerics
Abacus
- One of the very first computers
- Created by Babylonians and Chinese
- Calculated the arithmetic calculations quickly
- Latin word “abax” – counting table
- In ancient times, where there were no computers, calculators, or a pen and paper to perform
calculations
- Besides the abacus, people use their toes and fingers or stones in the dirt for calculations
o These methods is not suitable in long calculations
o So the abacus was use at that point of time
- Who created the abacus
o Still no one know who created it
o Iti was believed that Mesopotamia used the abacus
o Also used in other civilization like Greek, Egyptians, Chinese and persian

Napier’s Bones
- Created by John Napier
o Spent all of his time making calculations easier
o He developed a method so that multiplication and division can be carried out using simpler
operations of addition and subtractions
 How to convert multiplication into addition, division to subtraction
- It consist of wooden/bone rods that has numbers engrave in them
- An calculations are done with them in a straight forward way
Slide rule
- Mechanical analog computer
- Predecessor of electronic computers
- The most perfect or classic instrument/equipment for engineering is slide rule before
- It was called slide rule because the middle part can slide back and forth
- This is what they use when they went to the moon
o There are scenes in the movie apollo13 were they are using their slide rules
o Not for sure, that’s what they really used
- There are 2 kind
o Smaller one and large one
o The big one is teaching rule
o Almost as big as the long table
o In front of the classroom
- It was based on Napier’s logarithms
o Napier invented logarithms – it is a way to simplify multiplication and division
o Slide rule is essentially a physical tool that implements these logarithmic relationships

Pascaline
- Invented by Blaise Pascal
- French mathematician that invented the world first mechanical calculator
- More than 50 prototype where created with widely varying desings
- Can perform addition and subtraction
- How does it work
o Input dials and output window
o Input dials have digits 0-9 written on it
o Using a stylus, rotate the dials clockwise to show output on output window

Stepped reckoner
- Leibniz Calculator
- one of the earliest devices capable of performing all four basic arithmetic operations: addition,
subtraction, multiplication, and division.
- Stepped Drum Mechanism: Leibniz's machine used a unique mechanism called the stepped drum
(or Leibniz wheel), which had staggered teeth of varying lengths. This allowed it to perform
addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.
o The drum had nine steps or ridges around its circumference, with each step representing
one of the digits from 0 to 9.
o A gear or tooth would engage with these steps. Depending on how many steps (or teeth)
the gear came into contact with, the drum would turn the gear a specific number of times.
For example, if the gear engaged with the second step, it would turn two positions,
representing the digit 2.
- Manual Operation: The machine was operated manually by turning a hand crank, which would
move gears connected to the stepped drum to perform calculations.
Jacquard loom
- Invented by joseph-marie jacquard – a weaver
- It controls every warp thread that go from the front and the back of the loom individually
- The loom can make very complex platterns more quickly and with greater accuracy than the
technology available before this loom is created
o How?
o There are punch cards on the second floor
o These cards are what carry the instructions that is read by the apparatus on the second
floor
o It tells the loom what patterns to create
o There are holes in the card – it was read using a series of pins up in the apparatus
o The holes tell the apparatus which threads should be raise for each pass of the shuttle
o Similar to computer punch cards – carried the instruction that told the early computers
what instruction to do
o So this is the great grandfather of the computer technology that we use today

Arithmometer
- Early calculator
- Thanks to the industrial revolution, there was a need to perform repetitive calculations
- Can do all four calculations and small enough to fit to the desktop
- First calculating machines to be mass produced
- It was sold for 90 years up to WW1
- More types of arithmometer was made, this was just the first
Babbage engine
Difference engine
- He intends on revolutionize calculation by mechanizing it
- This machine produces a polynomial calculation that were repeatable and error free
o Most especially, it was automatic
- Once set, the seemed able to think on its own
- When rotating the lever at the top, all of the gears from top to bottom is moving
- It is a project Babbage intended to build but did not complete due to technical and financial
challenges
- The Difference Engine was designed to solve polynomial equations by calculating successive
differences between values in a sequence.
- His imagination has already moved on in a more ambitious mechanism
Analytical engine
- General purpose calculating automaton
- For 30 years he would improve his design of this engine
- One of the crucial steps in modern computing
- Designed to perform computations using punch cards
 o A concept which is later used in the development of the first successful computer
- It has a complex mechanical components(gears, cogs and levers)
o Which allow it to do mathematical computation like addition, subtraction, multiplication and
division
- Machine also has a memory unit called the STORE(mean the memory)
o Use to hold data and instruction like modern computers
o The punch cards to input data and instructions
o Gear and cogs – series of gears and cogs set to specific positions to hold data
- And a control unit called Mill to manage its operation
o This is the part of the machine that perform computations

The first computer Programmer

- Ada
- English mathematician and writer
- Friend of Babbage and develop an interest with Babbage analytical engine
- Worked with Babbage first mechanical general-purpose computer, the analytical engine
- She is the first person to recognize that the machine could be applied to task beyond calculation
o Which led to her first published algorithm to be carried out to those kinds of machines
o Because of this, she is regarded as the first to recognize the full potential of a computing
machine
 Thus, one of the first programmers
- Ada translated an article from an Italian engineer on Babbage’s calculating machine
o Adding an elaborate set of her own notes
o These notes contain to be the first computer program
 An algorithm to be carried out by the machine
- Her worked stop because she died of cancer in 1852 at the age of 36
- Ada’s notes were so important in the early history of computers
o She develops a vision of the capability of the computers to go beyond mere calculations
which many others (like Babbage) only focus on those capabilities
o Her mindset of poetical science led them to ask questions about the analytical engine

Scheutzian Calculation engine

- Shet-see-an
- It was inspired by Charles Babbage’s Difference Engine
- The engine was designed primarily to compute and print mathematical tables, specifically for
polynomial functions.
- It used gears and levers similar to Babbage's Difference Engine but on a smaller scale and was one
of the earliest working versions of such a device.
- One of the innovative aspects of the Scheutzian engine was that it could produce printed output,
eliminating human errors in transcription.
o It has a printing mechanism that allows it to print its result

Tabulating machines
- Electromechanical machines designed to assist in summarizing information stored in punch cards
- Machine was develop to process data during 1890 US census
 - Later models was used in business application such as accounting and inventory control

Harvad Mark 1
- Automatic sequence-controlled calculator
- It was an early electromechanical computer which was built during 1940s
o What we mean by electromechanical is that it was full of gears and motors, levers
o Like it was a huge mechanical calculator
o The sequence of operations that it would perform(programs today), punched into a paper
tape and could be executed automatically add numbers, divide numbers
- This machine was use on printing the table of the values of numbers
- Also used in the early calculations in Manhattan project
o Design of the atomic bomb
- Can also print the output using electric typewriters
Z1
- Binary Electrically driven mechanical calculator
- Reading instruction in a punch celluloid filmdsxxsxs
o Unlike normal punch card(paper/cardboard) it uses a flexible plastic film
- First freely programmable computer in the world which used Boolean logic and binary floating-
point numbers
o The Z1 was one of the first machines that could be programmed by a user. This
programmability was achieved through punch tape (a long strip of paper with holes) that
allowed users to input instructions into the machine.
o The Z1 used Boolean logic, which is a mathematical system that deals with binary values
(true/false, or 1/0).
o The Z1 was among the first machines to use binary floating-point arithmetic, which allows
for the representation of very large or very small numbers efficiently.
Atanasoff-Berry Computer (ABC)
- John Vincent Atanasoff and Clifford Berry
- Their mission is to create the
- First automatic electronic digital computer
- The ABC was designed with a specific purpose, to solve systems of linear equations
- It has over 300 vacuum tubes – which revolutionize arithmetic calculations
ENIAC
- The world first programmable general-purpose electronic digital computer was formally dedicated
at the university of Pennsylvania
- After entering the second world war, 18 months
o The United States Army Ordinance Research and Development Command agreed to fund
the construction of the machine
o Used to compute values in artillery range tables
o Build this enormous computer in secret
 o It consist of tens of thousands of vacuum tubes
o Consumed 150 kilowatts – it create so much heat that it needs its own air-conditioning
system
o It can accomplish 5000 calculations per seconds
 Which solve multiple problems per hour
- ENIAC was program using a wired plug board and switches
o Which take days to plan on paper
o Took even longer to input in the computer
o The electronic speed where the program ran, save so much time compared to computers
that use card readers or other mechanical input devices
UNIVAC 1
- First commercially produced electronic computer
- Universal Automatic Computer
- 5600 tubes, 18,000 crystal diodes, 300 relays
- Can process 1000 computations per second
o 1,000 calculations is equal to 1 kiloflop
 Floating-point operation per second
o Modern devices are billions to trillions of flop

EDVAC
- EDVAC was among the first computers to implement the stored-program architecture (also known
as the von Neumann architecture). This meant the program's instructions and the data could be
stored in the same memory, unlike ENIAC, which had to be manually rewired for different tasks.
- Faster than ENIAC
Osborne 1
- It weighed about 24.5 pounds (11.1 kg) and was the size of a small suitcase, making it portable,
but not in the sleek, lightweight way we think of laptops today.
- It had a built-in carrying handle, so it could be transported, but it was more of a "luggable" than
what we would call portable or mobile today.
o Processor: It was powered by a Zilog Z80 CPU running at 4 MHz.
o RAM: It came with 64 KB of RAM, which was a decent amount for its time.
o Display: The Osborne 1 had a very small 5-inch monochrome CRT display (about the size of a
smartphone screen). It could display 52 characters per line and 24 lines of text.
o Storage: It came with two 5.25-inch floppy disk drives, which were used for data storage.
Each disk had a capacity of 91 KB.
- WordStar (word processing)
- SuperCalc (spreadsheet software)
- CBASIC and MBASIC (programming languages)
- The Osborne 1 did not have a built-in battery, so it had to be plugged into a power outlet to work.
This limited its portability compared to later laptops with battery power.
- The Osborne 1 was the world's first commercially successful portable computer. It was heavy by
today's standards, with a small screen and no battery, but its affordability, bundled software, and
early portability made it a breakthrough in computing history.
First computer company
- The company was later renamed Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation (EMCC) and was
responsible for designing and building several early computers.
- Created ENIAC UNIVAC

*** Focus kayo dun bold texts and highlighted words :) ***