DocAndersen
The modern computer age began with the computation machine of Charles Babbage and the mathematical processes of Aida Lovelace. From that beginning, we moved to a Machine called the Eniac. Erica was developed by IBM to help with several larger calculations required for moving troops and other activities during World War II. ENIAC was the size of most houses, and honestly slower than the cell phone you have in your hand or pocket. Slow, in the computation reality. Still faster than a human being, but slow in terms of what we expect from computers today. People always argue the next big leap occurred with the rise of cloud computing but I don’t think that.
The next change was the explosion of non-mainframe mail systems. Profs was a mainframe mail system that many companies used for internal mail. The rise of X.400 addressing made it possible for one company to send mail to another. The ARPA Net or what was later to be called DARPA Net was the first connected network to help people doing research and development for the various US government Department of Defence agencies. At the same time the MOD’s of Canada, the UK, many countries in the Societ Block of that time and so on were all building networks so that computers could talk to each other. This gave rise to the next big thing, IP or Internet protocol.
IP suddenly allowed multiple computers to exist on the same network. In the days of Token Ring networks, there was an absolute limit to the number of devices that could be on a Token Ring. One more joined, and one of the already connected computers was kicked off. It was called a beaconing ring. When too many devices were on the token ring. The rise of IP addressing, the rise of ethernet doomed Token Ring. Now computers could be unique on a network. In the late 1980s, the Swiss Research facility known as CERN created what I consider to be the 4th computing revolution. The scientists were looking for a way that a reach project could quickly connect with other projects and share information. At that point, it was called the HyperText Transfer Protocol. Using a computer program you could ask for Http and type in an address. A web page appeared. As more and more IP connected devices appeared, HTTP added the additional we now as WWW or world wide web.
More to come!
The first four Computer Revolutions
1.Computational Machines (Lovelace and Babbage)
2.Mainframes (Government and many others)
3.PC and Email
4.The World Wide Web
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Question of
Did you know Aida Lovelace was actually Lord Byron’s Daughter?
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Yes
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No
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Question of
Do you remember the IBM PC Jr?
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Yes
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No
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Question of
Have you ever seen a Kaypro Computer?
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Yes
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No
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Question of
Do you remember the Sinclair Computer?
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Yes
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No
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Question of
Have you ever seen a card based computer programming system?
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Yes
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No
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Q: Did you know Aida Lovelace was actually Lord Byron’s Daughter?
Yes (1 votes) – 11%
No (8 votes) – 89%
Q: Do you remember the IBM PC Jr?
Yes (3 votes) – 30%
No (7 votes) – 70%
Q: Have you ever seen a Kaypro Computer?
No (10 votes) – 100%
Q: Do you remember the Sinclair Computer?
Yes (3 votes) – 30%
No (7 votes) – 70%
Q: Have you ever seen a card-based computer programming system?
Yes (7 votes) – 70%
No (3 votes) – 30%
Kaypros were called computers for writers 🙂 That was their big selling point.
The IBM PC Jr. was the first personal computer for public consumption (mass-market) but not the first computer.
The Sinclair was a switch based computer that pre-dated the Apple and the IBM Jr.
Thanks for the history of computer. I know little though I’m fascinated to learn more of its history. If I can remember well, the keyboards were huge it would take hours to type a few sentences. Is that true?
I’m still amazed how computers, radios and smartphones work.
Thanks. I’ve lived through the majority of the changes, I am still searching for the next big thing!
HTTP was based off some sorta microfiche annotation system developed for the FBI and law enforcement. Didn’t really implement well in an analog sense…
I think Berners-Lee was trying to apply it to the real world at CERN.
and entirely digital. I can’t find anything about the FBI precursor
Let see, 1980 roughly – so you just have to wait another 11 years.
hahaahaha declassification humor?
sir, yes sir
50 years is my guess as there is no “threat” to national security. Although in the past few years they have modified the concept of threat significantly so you may have to wait until 36 more years.
FDR’s WWII papers are still not released.
nor anything about the Kennedy assassinations. so perhaps 50 years isn’t long enough…
i think presidential stuff is 75 years. Although some of the Kennedy stuff was released this year. The WH pulled back a number of documents set to be released though.
no surprise there. they’re never gonna fess up about it…
I suppose that is fair. I wonder what happens when the records are finally moved from paper to digital and then someone releases them into the wild.
then we’ll know at last. assuming they aren’t faked
It will sadly require the handwritten notes to be released as well as the voice recordings so we can validate everything is real.
assuming that critical evidence hasn’t been destroyed or even just misplaced in the decades since…
well, my deepest hope is that the process of sealing was adhered to, but of course, the reality is you are right.
not even talking about something being conveniently misplaced, but genuinely lost after decades…
i suspect there is a high probability of lost documents. But the chain of custody is something the archivists focus on, so my hope would be not much loss.
but better than half the folks on the chain are dead by now
for presidential that is always the case. Its a minimum of 75 years under the FOIA act and somebody has to request the documents at that point.
what’s the statute of limitations on treason?
there are no limits on treason. If you are caught, even after 75 years. Now, most likely the person is dead.
So being hung for reason wouldn’t have the same impact.
but we’d feel better after defiling their corpse
I suspect we wouldn’t. The horror of realizing that we’ve had coverups for more than 75 years is probably enough damage.
I was kidding, but now I wonder how many Americans actually would feel better about it…
A friend of mine is a historian (History professor) at Duke. He worries that the secrets from WWII, that haven’t been released will change the world’s perceptions forever.
Hitler based his eugenics programs off the American precursors. He originally praised President Coolidge for his vision, but then later rebuked him for lacking the courage to follow his conviction to the logical conclusion
that the sorta thing he’s worried about?
no because that is public knowledge.
there are things that happened, events that were noted and known that weren’t shared with the rest of the world.
you mean, if it was revealed that FDR knew about Pearl Harbor but did nothing to prevent the attack?
That he knew about the internment camps before he implemented it in the US.
still can’t believe the US did that
It is a blight on the US history. but, if FDR knew about the Nazi camps and still did that, it is much worse.
which is tough to do…
There are things in history that we are better off not knowing. Stalin disappeared more than 20 million people.
Pol Pot may have removed more than 50% of the people of cambodia.
Stalin killed more Russians than Hitler did, and Hitler was trying his best!
yes. Stalin also removed the people killed in many cases from the records, as if they never lived.
When I was 12 we went to Ankur Wot in Cambodia. I was amazed by the beauty of the place.
On the way back to Bangkok we were stopped by the Cambodian Army, and waited for two/three hours.
Later we found out that the Khmer Rouge had blown up a convey for Cambodian Army personnel ahead.
Revisionist history was pioneered by the Egyptians, but Stalin certainly brought it into the 20th century- even going so far as to having folks airbrushed out of photos…
A sad reality that the world has yet to deal with.
i wonder why the 20-30 million or more people that Stalin disappeared have no voice.
that was decades ago, and he was pretty thorough. so if he missed anyone, they likely died of old age…
I suspect you are right. Plus the records of that time were far less than what is captured today. There had to be other family members, some collective memory though, its too many people gone.
in large countries like Russia and China, they’d take out the whole family of people they considered dangerous
i suspect that you are right, but still, there is something more that cannot be erased of a human.
I’ve heard it said that nobody truly dies until nobody left living can remember them. communists thought they could accelerate the process…
well, in particular, Stalin did. funny, no one will ever forget him.
Brought me back to my intro to computer days at university having to learn the languages Basic and Cobalt and standing in front of a huge computer from floor to ceiling going boop beep bop and feeding it cards to see if I got the results right. If that had continued I would not have been a fan of computers.
i started out in the card days, actually with a PDP 11 from DEC! The PDP 11 had a keyboard, didn’t require cards but you had to push the code to the mainframe, and then hope it was right.
It took forever!
I’m always fascinated by the development of the computer because in my mind I can’t comprehend how man could make such an amazing machine and scale it down to what we have today. I’ve seen the computers that fill a room.
I was once part of a team that had to remove an old (room-sized) IBM system 30. It was in the basement of a building, we had to use chain saws!
Amazing. I still can’t comprehend the mind that it takes to assemble something that thinks and computes.
time.
And a huge bucket of 1’s and 0’s 🙂
Very interesting information. It is quite enjoyable to read about the history of computers.
Thanks – sometimes people forget that the computer and features of today, would replace most of the computers in the world in the 1940’s in terms of what they can do.
For me, this was all new, dear friend … I read with interest … I have never followed this development
most people didn’t – there were many great people in the computer world that time has forgotten.
Alan Turing is another name people forget.
This is all too complicated for me … I am not the most technically savvy … if I remember back 10 years how I was against buying a computer … my partner barely convinced me to buy one …. she said we were alive 100 years for monkeys because we don’t have a computer … all my friends already have one
your partner sounds very smart my friend.
What I know now would probably be difficult without him, my friend … but I didn’t miss him at the time
I suspect being without a computer now, would be hard for me.
what a great information doc….
Thanks – have you been away? I haven’t seen you for a bit///
Great Information here , thanks Doc
it is fun at times to look back and see what was there…
All of this brings back memories of my Dad. I cannot remember everything about what he did but we would tag along on some of his service calls growing up when he worked for RCA. There were banks we would go in the computer room and I remember the machines filled the room and they were huge.
Beautiful sky by the way, love the colors.
that is the last shot of my weather station from yesterday. I shared it here and on MyLot for you!
I bet your dad probably worked with my first boss in IT. He was 25 plus years at IBM. Awesome person!
That would be cool to know, and you might be right. I was just reading a little about RCS’s history. RCA marketed a Spectra 70 computer line that was hardware, but not software, compatible with IBM’s System/360 series.
I remember the RCA. It was a solid system but IBM out marketed RCA (also BULL, DEC and a few others).