6000 BC Knots in string used as a tally (storage) device. Probably by shepherds, to keep count of flocks. Knots stood for number of animals (sheep).

4000 BC Abacus. Chinese device uses beads on wires to represent numbers. By progressively sliding the beads, addition, subtraction, multiplication and division are possible. In speed tests, a skilled abacus user may rival an operator of a calculator in addition and subtraction. Also used by Japanese.

500 BC Water clocks and hourglasses measured the passing of time. Used in China and Rome.

1400 AD Clock making becomes a passion in Europe. The quest is for smaller, more complex, more accurate clocks. Again, dealing with the concept of measurement and accuracy. The invention of a sea-worthy clock was critical to accurate calculation of longitude.

1617 - 1650 Edmund Gunther and John Napier discovered logarithms and invented the slide rule. The log table was used into the 1970s on the slide rule.

1642 Blaise Pascal invents a calculating device called the Pascaline based on decade wheels like in an odometer. His machines consisted of several wheels (6, 8 or 10) with the numbers 0 to 9 on each, closely resembling a telephone dial. The machines could add and subtract. He truly believed that his machines would save men hours of labor. However, they did not work well. Accurate gear cutting was not perfected. The mechanisms were forever out of order, and only Pascal and one of his workmen could fix them. Nearly identical devices are still in use today.

Pascal Calculator

1600s through 1700s Cottage industries developed, especially around weaving. These had limited output based on what each individual cottage (family) could produce beyond their own needs. Later, the Industrial Revolution began and was well under way by 1750. Textile mills automated the weaving process with weaving machines that produced abundant and cheap cloth which competed with villages of weavers and put many out of business. Many people had to go to work in the factories under poor, low-paying and dangerous conditions.

Workers in France wore a shoe called the Sabot and often would kick them into the weaving machines to stop them from working. This act became known as sabotage. It didn't work in the long run.

Sabot

1801 Joseph Jacquard - an industrial engineer, who worked for the management side of the mills, developed a loom run by punch cards to automate the weaving process. Prior to that the weaving had to be manually done by hand to create French tapestries (weavers). Cards of metal with holes pulled into looms and allowed rods (hooks) to go through the holes and pick up the thread or leave the thread where there were no holes. The process was an abstract representation of modern programming. The machine could: Code information on cards (pattern of weaving). Cards could be linked to present a sense of instruction (programming). Could be used for automation.

The Jacquard Loom

1833 Charles Babbage, considered the Father of Computing, invents the Difference Engine, which was a successful adding machine. He then developed the Analytical Engine, the first programmable computer and the basis of the architecture of today's computers. After working on the Analytical Engine, with the help and support of Ada, Countess of Lovelace, Babbage failed to complete the device as the Analytical Engine would have required a massive undertaking to build in Babbage's time. The ones he tried to build were massive and powered by steam. He couldn't get the anticipated computer results. However, he was able to move forward the practices of machine technology. In 1960's the British Museum, with a grant from IBM, was able to successfully complete the Analytical Engine.
Babbage's Analytical Engine had the basic characteristics of modern computers: Input device Control Unit Mathematical Unit Store (Memory) Output Device		Analytical Engine
The Analytical Engine was so constructed that the instruction set could be self modifying due to the outcomes of certain operations. Babbage was an odd character and hated hurdy-gurdy men. He tried to get them banned even though they used a device (the organ) that was programmed and complex, much as his machine ideas.

1833 to 1843 and beyond Ada Lovelace (The Countess of Lovelace) was the daughter of the English poet Lord Byron. Ada, who was a splendid mathematician and one of the few people who fully understood Babbage's vision, created a program for the Analytical Engine. She met Babbage in 1833 and worked with him for many years. Had the Analytical Engine ever actually worked, Ada's program would have been able to compute a mathematical sequence known as Bernoulli numbers. Based on this work, Ada is now credited as being the first computer programmer and, in 1979, a modern programming language was named ADA in her honor. She had ideas for the following: Concept of a loop Conditional Jump (IF . . . Then statements) Sub-programs

Ada

1880-1900 Herman Hollerith invented tabulating machine used to do the U.S. Census. The Census took too long to tabulate. Hollerith's boss, Dr. Billings, wanted him to solve the problem. He entered his machines in a competition held by the Census Bureau in 1889 to determine which of all available methods would be best for the next census. The Hollerith Electrical Tabulating System was the overwhelming winner. The machine used punch cards for it's programming. It was eight times faster than the nearest competitor. Hollerith formed the Computing Tabulating Machine Company (CTR) in 1896, which eventually became IBM.

Hollerith Tabulator

1910
James Power further refined the Census machine process and founded Remington-Rand Corporation in 1911.

1924 Thomas J. Watson, Sr. - Born in 1874, was highly principled man who went to work as a salesman for NCR (National Cash Register) at age 33. Became 3rd in charge at NCR then was fired at age 40. Later, took over CTR and changed the name to IBM in 1924. Ran the company like a general with a family spirit. There were no layoffs during the depression. IBM built the first reliable printing tabulators, electric typewriters and punch card machines. Thomas J. Watson, Jr. - took IBM into the computer age and developed IBM's reputation for great service.

1939 to 1944 Howard Aiken's Harvard Mark I (the IBM ASCC) The MARK I was developed with a $500,000 grant from IBM. Aiken used Charles Babbage's ideas. Many consider that the modern computer era commenced with the MARK I, the first large-scale automatic digital computer, which was developed between 1939 and 1944. This device, the brainchild of a Harvard graduate, Howard H. Aiken, was officially known as the IBM automatic sequence controlled calculator (ASCC), but is more commonly referred to as the Harvard Mark I.

Harvard Mark I (IBM ASCC)

The Mark I was constructed out of switches, electromagnetic relays, rotating shafts, and clutches, and was described as sounding like a "roomful of ladies knitting." The machine contained more than 750,000 components, was 50 feet long, 8 feet tall, and weighed approximately 5 tons!
Although the Mark I was considered to be the first digital computer, its architecture was significantly different from modern machines. The device consisted of many calculators, which worked on parts of the same problem under the guidance of a single control unit. Instructions were read in on paper tape, data was provided on punched cards, and the device could only perform operations in the sequence in which they were received.
This machine was based on numbers that were 23 digits wide - it could add or subtract two of these numbers in three-tenths of a second, multiply them in four seconds, and divide them in ten seconds.

1939 Dr. John Vincent Atanasoff, Iowa State College associate professor of mathematics and physics began to envision a computational device that was "digital." He believed that analog devices were too restrictive and could not get the type of accuracy he wanted. The idea of building an electronic digital computer came to him while he was sitting in a tavern. Dr. Atanasoff came up with four principles for his electronic digital computer. He would use electricity and electronics as the medium for the computer. In spite of custom, he would use base-two numbers (the binary system for his computer. He would use condensers for memory and would use a regenerative or "jogging" process to avoid lapses that might be caused by leakage of power. He would compute by direct logical action and not by enumeration as used in analog calculating devices.

As Dr. Atanasoff worked on his computer project, he asked a colleague to recommend a graduate student to assist him with his project. The graduate student that was introduced to him was Clifford Berry. Berry was gifted electrical engineer and had very similar background as Dr. Atanasoff did. In December 1939, the first prototype of the Atanasoff Berry Computer (ABC) was ready. The ABC showed some of the potentials of a computer and it amazed the University. So in 1939, Dr. Atanasoff and his assistant, Clifford Berry, built the world's first electronic digital computer. The ABC (Atanasoff-Berry Computer) used vacuum tube logic.

Atanasoff-Berry Computer

1946
John Mauchley meets with Atanasoff & Berry in 1940. Shortly after, Mauchley and Presper Eckert begin development of the ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Calculator), with a grant from the War Department to calculate projectile trajectories. ENIAC was not finished until after the end of the war (1946). The ENIAC took 200,000 man-hours to build, weighed 30 tons and used 18,000 vacuum tubes (one went out every 12 minutes). It was 1,000 times faster than the MARK I. It was programmed like a telephone operator connected calls.

ENIAC

ENIAC Programming Panel

The figure on the left shows a typical triode vacuum tube. Because of the Edison Effect, heat from the filament causes free electrons to boil off of the oxide coating of the cathode. The positive voltage on the plate attracts the electrons and the moving electrons produce a current flow. A negative bias voltage on the grid repels some of the electrons and prevents them from reaching the plate, resulting in less current flow. In this way a changing negative charge on the grid modulates the plate current. This creates the on/off effect of a digital computer.

1947
Dr. Mauchly and Dr. Eckert form a private corporation for the commercial development of electronic computers.

1951
Eckert and Mauchley deliver the UNIVAC (Universal Automatic Computer) to the US Bureau of Census. UNIVAC used core memory. At first programs & data were stored on punch-cards and punch tape, later on magnetic tape.

1952 UNIVAC 1 - first commercial computer you could buy. Eckert, Manchly and Hopper worked on it and Remington-Rand, Sperry-Rand and Unisys helped build it. In 1952 the Census Bureau bought the first one. It predicted that Ike would win the Presidency.

UNIVAC 1

Circa 1958 Grace M. Hopper - a Naval officer, was the third programmer on the MARK I. Considered the Mother of COBOL (Common Business Oriented Language). She found the first computer bug, literally! There was a moth stuck in the computer's electromagnetic relays and fouling it up. She continued to work on computer and assembler languages. Retired in 1986 as a Rear Admiral. Died in 1992. The U.S.S. Hopper is named after her.

The First Computer Bug

Grace Hopper

1959-1964
Bell Labs invents the transistor (Transfer + Resistor). Transistors are the basic building blocks of computer hardware.

A transistor is an electronic device that has three ends: a source, a sink, and a gate. When the gate of a transistor is ON (or has a value 1) then electricity flows from the source to the sink and the transistor is said to be ON, otherwise when the gate of a transistor is OFF (or has a value 0) then electricity does not flow from the source to the sink and the transistor is said to be OFF. Today's microprocessors have integrated circuits with millions of microscopic transistors.

1965-1970
Texas Instruments develops the Integrated Circuit, based on Photo-Lithographic technology. The integrated circuit consisted of an enhanced idea basically building on transistors. An integrated circuit, therefore, is a micro-electronic semiconductor device consisting of many interconnected transistors and other components.

ICs are constructed ("fabricated") on a small rectangle (a "die") cut from a Silicon wafer. This is known as the "substrate". Different areas of the substrate are "doped" with other elements to make them either "p-type" or "n-type" and polysilicon or aluminum tracks are etched in one to three layers deposited over the surface. The die is then connected into a package using gold wires, which are welded to "pads", usually found around the edge of the die.

The first integrated circuits contained only a few transistors. Small Scale Integration(SSI) brought circuits containing transistors numbered in the tens. Later, Medium Scale Integration (MSI) contained hundreds of transistors. Further development lead to Large Scale Integration (LSI) (thousands), and VLSI (hundreds of thousands and beyond). In 1986 the first one megabyte RAM was introduced which contained more than one million transistors.

LSI circuits began to be produced in large quantities around 1970 for computer main memories and pocket calculators. For the first time it became possible to fabricate a CPU or even an entire microprocessor (An integrated circuit that contains the entire central processing unit of a computer on a single chip.) on a single integrated circuit.

1971
Microprocessor developed by Gilbert Hyatt. In 1968, Gilbert Hyatt took the integrated circuit a step further by including in one place all the pieces necessary to operate a computer (except memory and interface). He applied for a patent on this microprocessor in 1970. The following year, while his paper work wended its way through the patent office, three engineers from Intel Corporation created the first commercially viable microprocessor. Thus they have usually been credited with its invention. But in 1990, the U.S. Patent Office gave that recognition to Hyatt. Intel's 4004 (4-bit) microprocessor was the on the market, however, and in 1974 they added the 8080 (8-bit), sixteen times more powerful. This was the hardware for the first popular microcomputer, the Altair 8800.
The Altair 8800 Powered by an Intel 8080 processor, the predecessor to the 8088 used in the IBM PC, was the first personal computer. The Altair 8800 made its debut in an article that appeared on the cover of the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics. Within two months the little company MITS, was struggling with thousands of orders.

Altair 8800

This computer was not like today's computers as you had to build it yourself and it would not really achieve anything. Basically it was just a box with switches and lights on the front. However the system was designed to be expandable with a bus that allowed plug in cards. The bus was to set the standard for the next 5 years. Within months expansion boards were available to add more memory and attach terminals or teleprinters. One of the most popular peripherals was the Teletype corporations ASR-33 teletype. The ASR-33 provided a printer, keyboard, and storage device (paper tape).

The company (MITS) would subsequently release newer versions (8800a, 8800b) with more slots and other enhancements.
Later came the first popular computers known as the Commodore PET and the Apple II, both of which used the 6502 and the TRS-80 based on the Zilog Z80. These all appeared in 1977.

1975
Paul Allen meets with Ed Roberts to demonstrate the newly written BASIC interpreter for the Altair. Despite never having touched an Altair before, the BASIC interpreter works flawlessly.

Paul Allen

After the demo succeeded Bill Gates joined Paul Allen in writing BASIC for the Altair computer and started Micro-soft later known as MICROSOFT. Bill Gates and Paul Allen license their newly written BASIC to MITS, their first customer. This is the first computer language program written for a personal computer. BASIC enabled companies to attach certain devices to the Altair and develop programs. Later other chips became invented and a whole new industry developed.

Bill Gates

1977

Apple computer was the first mass-market computer. The first apple computer was primitive and was just to impress Steve Wozniak's friends at computer meetings. Steve Jobs became interested and they both joined together to develop and sell Apple and Macintosh computers. The Apple 1 had no case and no keyboard but that showed there was a market for a real computer. The Apple II was born and soon started mass marketing, which grew and grew.

1981
IBM is born. In August 1981 IBM started the personal computer revolution which would change the future. They released its first personal computer. At this time the Apple II and the Tandy TRS-80 were also on the market.

However the IBM model had two main advantages over the other two as these where its open architecture and modularity. Open architecture is a term to mean the ability to integrate new hardware and software into the system. This was the first computer that was recognizable to be upgradeable via expansion slots on the motherboard. Modularity means that all hardware and software should be backward compatible.

The main advantages of these would be:

• There is no need to replace the whole computer once it became obsolete but parts could be removed and upgraded.
• The user can tailor the computer to his/her requirements
• When the computer needs to be repaired a single unit could be replaced therefore cutting down the time and cost.

The rest, as they say, is history. Much more detail about the history of computers can be given. This has been just a brief overview.

Addendum:
During the early years of computer development there were several brands/platforms that were developed as desktop or personal computers. Three company's products in particular stand out from the rest. Those three are the Commodore Amiga, the Apple Macintosh and the IBM compatible PC.
One of the most user friendly, advanced in its capabilities, more powerful in processing power than the others, yet inexpensive to purchase for both hardware and software was the Commodore Amiga.

The Amiga had color graphics and animation capabilities before both the Macintosh and PC. It had a GUI and the design of the operating system file management made graphics and animation files much less memory demanding than the other platforms. Early on, it was favored by TV production studios and broadcasting stations for its inexpensive special effects capabilities using the Video Toaster card and software. Color digitization and scanning as well as videotape editing and animation, including 3D rendering and morphing were easy, inexpensive and produced excellent results. The AMIGA was well known as a video computer and was used in lots of TV Series (Robocop, Babylon 5, Sea Quest, etc.) and cinema preproductions (e.g. Jurassic Park, Titanic).

Amiga3000 PC

Amigas were advertised on TV in the early 90s. Several schools and districts across the country purchased them as an alternative to the Macintosh.

Unfortunately, the biggest problem the AMIGA always had was its owner. Commodore being once a major player in the PC business took most of the profit from the AMIGA division to keep up in the PC market. In the end they didn't succeed and Commodore was liquidated. Then every AMIGA user was looking for a savior. When Escom came by it all looked so good. But Escom acquired too much in a short time which forced them into liquidation as well. After that, the Amiga fans had to wait for nearly one year and were begging for a new savior with lots of cash and good customer-service. Well, they were lucky, because Gateway 2000 bought the remains of AMIGA Technologies. They founded a second company for R&D and they were working on really crazy stuff. In autumn 1999, the Amiga OS got updated to V3.5 by Haage & Partner. This much needed update brought many valuable features and some needed debugging. By Christmas 1999 the first update for Amiga OS 3.5 was downloadable. Lots of bugs were fixed and some new functions were added.

The Amiga is still very popular, in both the U.S. and Europe, with graphic artists and video/TV professionals. There are many Web sites and much information available about Amiga hardware and software on the Internet today.
Of course, Apple's Macintosh suffered a similar fate due to the proprietary nature and high cost of both its hardware and software and poor marketing. Steve Job's ego didn't help either.
Because of shrewd (some might say even ruthless) marketing, the licensing of the Windows OS rather than selling to IBM, the development of IBM clones by other manufacturers, and the failure of others to see that the money would ultimately be in software more than hardware, Microsoft's Bill Gates won the OS platform wars. It could be argued that business decisions rather than performance capabilities determined the kind of PCs we have today. Time will tell if the future might change that situation. (Can you say Linux! Perhaps even Java!)

© Russ Erdman, January 1, 2001
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