Transcript History of Computers

History of Computers
Compiled
IITG Team
Outline
• History
• The von Neumann architecture
• 1. The abacus, invented in ancient Asia, was
the first computing device known to carry out
elementary arithmetic calculations such as
addition, subtraction, multiplication etc, used
until just not so long ago (1960). Modern
abaci are often constructed as a bamboo
frame with beads sliding on wires, but
originally they were beans or stones moved in
grooves in sand or on tablets of wood, stone,
or metal.
A Brief Overview of the History of
Computers
• Early calculation devices
– Abacus, Pascaline
– Leibniz device
– Jacquard’s weaving looms
– Babbage machines: difference and analytic
engines
– Hollerith machine
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C++ Programming: Program Design
Including Data Structures, Sixth Edition
A Brief Overview of the History of
Computers (cont’d.)
• Early computer-like machines
– Mark I
– ENIAC
– Von Neumann architecture
– UNIVAC
– Transistors and microprocessors
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C++ Programming: Program Design
Including Data Structures, Sixth Edition
A Brief Overview of the History of
Computers (cont’d.)
• Categories of computers
– Mainframe computers
– Midsize computers
– Micro computers (personal computers)
– Mobile devices
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C++ Programming: Program Design
Including Data Structures, Sixth Edition
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In 1970 the floppy disk was inroduced
1972 -- Intel's 8008 and 8080
1972 -- DEC PDP 11/45
1976 -- Jobs and Wozniak build the Apple I
1978 -- DEC VAX 11/780
1979 -- Motorolla 68000
1981 -- IBM PC
1982 -- Compaq IBM-compatible PC
Computer History
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1937
– John V. Atanasoff creates what is considered the official first electronic
computer. It is known as the Alanasoff Berry Computer or simply ABC.
1943
– During World War II Alan Turing develops the Colossus which is a top
secret British code-breaking computer. It was built to decode German
secret messages.
1946
– An electronic computing machine called ENIAC is built by John Mauchly
and Presper Eckert.
1947
– The semiconductor revolution is blasted off when William Shockley,
John Bardeen, and Walter Brattain invent and test what is called a point
contact transistor.
Computer History
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1949
– At Cambridge University Maurice Wilkes assembles the first practical
stored program computer called the EDSAC.
Computer History
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1952
– The UNIVAC used by the U.S. Census Bureau becomes the first
commercial computer to attract substantial public attention.
1953
– IBM ships its first electronic computer system called the 701. 3
1955
– The first fully transistorized computer TRADIC is announced by Bell
Laboratories.
1956
– The TX-0 is built by MIT researchers. It is the first general purpose,
programmable computer that is built using transistors
Computer History
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1958
– The first integrated circuit is created by Jack Kilby at Texas Instruments.
This proved that both resistors and capacitors could exist on the same
semiconductor material.
1960
– The first commercial modem called Dataphone is desiged by Bell Labs.
It was designed specifically for converting digital computer data to
analog signals for transmission across a long distance network.
1961
– According to Datamation magazine IBM has approximately an 81.2
percent share of the computer market. IBM also introduced the 1400
Series computer system in this year.
Computer History
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1964
– IBM announces a family of six mutually compatible computers and 40
peripherals that work together called the System/360.
– In 1964 IBM’s SABRE reservation system is also setup up for American
Airlines.
1965
– Digital Equipment Corporation introduces the first commercially
successful minicomputer called the PDP-8.
1968
– Intel was founded on July 18, 1968, by Robert Noyce, Gordon Moore,
and Andrew Grove.
1970
– The computer-to-computer communication revolution expands when
the Department of Defense establishes four devices on the ARPAnet.
Computer History
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1973
– At the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center Robert Metcalfe devices the
Ethernet method of networking.
1974
– Researchers at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center design the Alto
which is the first workstation with a built-in mouse for input.
1975
– Microsoft is founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen on April 4, 1975.
1976
– Apple is established on April 1, 1976 by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and
Ronald Wayne to sell a single board computer called the Apple I.
1977
– Apple Computer introduces the Apple II computer system.
Computer History
• 1981
– IBM introduces its Personal Computer (PC), kicking off
the fast growth of the personal computer market and
revolution.
– Xerox also introduces the Star which is the first
personal computer with a graphical user interface
(GUI).
– The first portable computer is also completed by
Adam Osborne. Like many inventions of the day it
gets its name from the inventor and it’s called the
Osborne I, go figure. But check this, the Osborne I
portable computer weighed in at 24 pounds and sold
for $1795 dollars at the time.
Computer History
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1983
– Apple introduces its Lisa computer incorporating a GUI very similar to
that first introduced on the Xerox Star.
– Compaq Computer Corporation introduces its first PC clone that uses
the same software as the IBM PC.
1984
– Apple Computer launches the Macintosh which is the first successful
mouse driven computer with a GUI. It was launched in fact with a single
$1.5 million commercial during the 1984 Super Bowl.
1985
– Microsoft ships Windows 1
1990
– The World Wide Web (WWW) is born after researcher Tim Berners-Lee
develops HTML, the Hypertext Markup Language.
Computer History
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1995
– Microsoft releases the first mainstream 32-bit operating system
Windows 95 in huge numbers.
1998
– Google is co-founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they are
students at Stanford University. The company is first incorporated as a
privately held company in September of 1998.
2000
– Y2K problem
2000 +
– Cell Phones
– Smart Phones
– Tablets
• The modern microcomputer has roots going
back to the USA in the 1940’s.
• Of the many researchers, the Hungarian-born
mathematician and early computer scientist,
John von Neumann (1903-57), is worthy of
special mention.
– He developed a very basic model (named after the
him) for computers which we are still using today.
• The von Neumann architecture is a design
model for a stored-program digital computer
that uses a central processing unit (CPU) and a
single separate storage structure (linear
memory) to hold both instructions and data.
– The instructions and data of a program can be
stored in a linear memory array.
– Separate hardware from programs.
The evolution of computers is a history
of separation and reuse!
• The most important separation is the
separation of hardware from software.
• Hardware should be constructed for general
purpose.
– Operations supported by the CPU should be
designed at Data manipulation level.
• Not at the application level.
– Leave the mapping from application functions to general
purpose functions to program developers.
External Storage, extending main memory
More detailed
• The terms "von Neumann architecture" and
"stored-program computer" are generally
used interchangeably.
• A stored-program digital computer is one that
keeps its programmed instructions, as well as
its data, in read-write, random-access memory
(RAM).
• Von Neumann separated a computer’s hardware into
five primary crucial components:
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CPU (with limited memory called register set)
Main memory (RAM, working storage)
External memory Permanent storage
Input
Output
Communication devices (expanded in modern computer,
no such a concept back to Von’s time).
• The above components are connected together by data
busses (where binary numbers are transported back
and forth) layout on the motherboard.
John von Neumann with the ENIAC
• The ENIAC was invented by J. Presper Eckert
and John Mauchly at the University of
Pennsylvania and began construction in 1943
and was not completed until 1946.
• It occupied about 1,800 square feet and used
about 18,000 vacuum tubes, weighing almost
50 tons.
• ENIAC, short for Electronic Numerical
Integrator And Computer, was the first
general-purpose electronic computer. It was a
Turing-complete, digital computer capable of
being reprogrammed to solve a full range of
computing problems.
– ENIAC was designed to calculate artillery firing
tables for the U.S. Army's Ballistic Research
Laboratory, but its first use was in calculations for
the hydrogen bomb.
• ENIAC could be programmed to do different tasks, but this
required a partial rewiring of the machine.
– Hardware level modifications.
• One of the scientists working on ENIAC, J. Presper Eckert,
came up with the idea of a stored program, which would
make it possible to load a computer program into computer
memory from disk. The computer could then run the
program without being manually reprogrammed.
• The idea was not used in the design of ENIAC,but a followup project, called EDVAC, which Von Neumann was closely
associated with, did incorporate the stored program.
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A paper Von Neumann wrote in 1944, entitled "First Draft of a Report on EDVAC,"
explained the revolutionary ideas that were to govern the development of
computers for the next two decades.
Von Neumann proposed a separation of storage, arithmetic and control functions;
random-access memory (RAM); stored programs; arithmetic modification of
instructions; conditional branching; a choice between binary number and decimal
number representation; and a choice between serial and parallel operation.
Basically, he introduced new procedures in their logical organization, the "codes"
by which a fixed system of wiring could solve a great variety of problems.
Particularly the idea of a stored program and the solutions for realizing the
equipment that could deal with stored programs were revolutionary, promising
great gains in speed and productivity.
In summary, Von Neumann rethought the basic design of the computer into the
separate components of arithmetic function, central control (now known as the
central processing unit [CPU]), memory (the hard drive) and the input and output
devices. Under Von Neumann's supervision, a computer with these capabilities
was developed at the Institute of Advanced Studies from 1946 to 1951. Although
the machine quickly became a dinosaur, it was the first true forerunner of the
contemporary high-speed digital computer.
• Although the Ballistic Research Laboratory
was the sponsor of ENIAC, John von
Neumann, working in Los Alamos, became
aware of this computer subsequently became
so involved with ENIAC that the first test
problem run was computations for the
hydrogen bomb, not artillery tables.
– The input/output for this test was one million
cards.
Earlier than ENIAC
• Short for Atanasoff-Berry Computer, the ABC started being developed by
Professor John Vincent Atanasoff and graduate student Cliff Berry in 1937
and continued to be developed until 1942 at the Iowa State College (now
Iowa State University).
– On October 19, 1973, US Federal Judge Earl R. Larson signed his decision that
the ENIAC patent by Eckert and Mauchly was invalid and named Atanasoff the
inventor of the electronic digital computer.
– Although the Judge ruled that the ABC computer was the first digital computer
many still consider the ENIAC to be the first digital computer.
• The Z1 originally created by Germany's Konrad Zuse in his parents living
room in 1936 to 1938 is considered to be the first electrical binary
programmable computer.
– The Z1 had 64-word memory (each word contained 22 bits) and a clock speed
of 1 Hz.
– To program the the Z1 required that the user insert punch tape into a punch
tape reader and all output was also generated through punch tape.
• Ok, that was just some history.
• The amazing thing is, his model is still
completely applicable today.
In modern computers, the above crucial components are hosted by a
motherboard (which is a printed circuit board (PCB).
What is a Computer?
• Necessity is the mother of inventions
• Lazy and smart people (some of them also
smart) need to live good lives without
working.
• Inventions save "lazy" human beings
• Computers were invented to spoil human
beings.
A tool - A “machine” too simple to be
called a
• A device, such as a saw or a pair of
scissors, used to perform or facilitate
manual or mechanical work.
• A tool has limited functions!
• But the way to combine the functions is
unlimited!
• Program is about how to combine the
functions provided by the tool in certain
sequences.
A machine
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A more complicated tool, usually called machine, should facilitate memorization of intermediate
steps of actions or calculations.
– You think of examples?
• The abacus
– Still no program.
• Program is in the brains of the user of the abacus.
– But the machine can keep track of intermediate
steps already.
• A more powerful machine should automate itself.
– Hard-wired program controlled computers
– Examples?
• The first air plane, first car.
• The function is fixed after the machine is wired and
constructed.
• Dedicated machines.
• Notice that both data and instructions are
saved in the same memory which is a linear
byte array. So, a byte can be written as a data
on one occasion and later may be treated as
an instruction on a later occasion.
• This is exactly what compilers do.
Program is part of the hardware
too!
• The earliest computing machines had fixed programs.
• Some very simple computers still use this design, either for
simplicity or training purposes. For example, a desk calculator
(in principle) is a fixed program computer. It can do basic
mathematics, but it cannot be used as a word processor or a
gaming console.
Programmable and
reprogrammable Computer
• A machine should be programmable and
reprogrammable.
• Separate programs from hardware
• Stored-program
• Using same hardware, the machine should behave
differently simply by changing software.
• General purpose Computers we use today.
Ultimate goal of the computer
evolution?
• The ultimate goal is to have a intelligent
machine close to human beings
– You do not have to program.
– All programs can be automatically generated by
itself, the future computer should know how to
translate end user’s requirements described in
natural language to programs by itself or even just
directly read your mind.
– We are not at there yet.
Yes, Computer Replace Human Beings
• Can we achieve it?
– Hard to say.
– My personal view is that in the absolute sense
impossible, but in a practical sense it is very likely
in the future.
• Good or bad?
– Hard to say!
• Do we really want to be there?
– Many issues!
• Such computers implement a universal Turing
machine and have a sequential architecture.
• The design of the imperative languages is based
directly on the von Neumann architecture
– Efficiency is the primary concern, rather than the suitability
of the language for software development
Reference
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Textbook
Wikipedia
The Internet
http://www.karbosguide.com/books/pcarchitecture/ch
apter02.htm
• http://www.madehow.com/inventorbios/66/John-vonNeumann.html#ixzz0UaVGPlHc
• http://www.madehow.com/inventorbios/66/John-vonNeumann.html
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