Cambridge Digital Library - University of Cambridge Cambridge University Library holds the largest and most important collection of the scientific works of Isaac Newton (1642-1727). Newton was closely associated with Cambridge. He came to the University as a student in 1661, graduating in 1665, and from 1669 to 1701 he held the Lucasian Chair of Mathematics. In 1699 Newton was appointed Master of the Mint, and in 1703 he was elected President of the Royal Society, a post he occupied until his death. After his death, the manuscripts in Newton's possession passed to his niece Catherine and her husband John Conduitt. In 1872 the fifth earl passed all the Newton manuscripts he had to the University of Cambridge, where they were assessed and a detailed catalogue made. The remainder of the Newton papers, many concerned with alchemy, theology and chronology, were returned to Lord Portsmouth. See also
World’s First Computer Rebuilt, Rebooted After 2,000 Years | Gadget Lab A British museum curator has built a working replica of a 2,000-year-old Greek machine that has been called the world’s first computer. A dictionary-size assemblage of 37 interlocking dials crafted with the precision and complexity of a 19th-century Swiss clock, the Antikythera mechanism was used for modeling and predicting the movements of the heavenly bodies as well as the dates and locations of upcoming Olympic games. The original 81 shards of the Antikythera were recovered from under the sea (near the Greek island of Antikythera) in 1902, rusted and clumped together in a nearly indecipherable mass. Scientists dated it to 150 B.C. Many scientists have worked since the 1950s to piece together the story, with the help of some very sophisticated imaging technology in recent years, including X-ray and gamma-ray imaging and 3-D computer modeling. Now, though, it has been rebuilt. In the video from New Scientist below, Wright shows how the machine works. See Also: Go Back to Top.
FONDAZIONE GALILEO GALILEI - Homepage Who was Ada? | Ada Lovelace Day Who was Ada Lovelace? By Sydney Padua, author of The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace & Babbage. Read the longer biography of Ada Lovelace by Suw Charman-Anderson, taken from our book, A Passion for Science: Stories of Discovery and Invention, but for a short overview of her life and achievements, read on! The woman most often known as ‘Ada Lovelace’ was born Ada Gordon in 1815, sole child of the brief and tempestuous marriage of the erratic poet George Gordon, Lord Byron, and his mathematics-loving wife Annabella Milbanke. Fearing that Ada would inherit her father’s volatile ‘poetic’ temperament, her mother raised her under a strict regimen of science, logic, and mathematics. At the age of 19 she was married to an aristocrat, William King; when King was made Earl of Lovelace in 1838 his wife became Lady Ada King, Countess of Lovelace. The Analytical Engine Her thwarted potential, and her passion and vision for technology, have made her a powerful symbol for modern women in technology.
Computer History Museum Computer History John Kopplin © 2002 Just a few years after Pascal, the German Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (co-inventor with Newton of calculus) managed to build a four-function (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division) calculator that he called the stepped reckoner because, instead of gears, it employed fluted drums having ten flutes arranged around their circumference in a stair-step fashion. Although the stepped reckoner employed the decimal number system (each drum had 10 flutes), Leibniz was the first to advocate use of the binary number system which is fundamental to the operation of modern computers. Leibniz's Stepped Reckoner (have you ever heard "calculating" referred to as "reckoning"?) In 1801 the Frenchman Joseph Marie Jacquard invented a power loom that could base its weave (and hence the design on the fabric) upon a pattern automatically read from punched wooden cards, held together in a long row by rope. Jacquard's Loom showing the threads and the punched cards
Computing at Harwell Computing at Harwell Jack Howlett 25 years of Theoretical Physics at Harwell:1954-1979 1. I came to Harwell in the summer of 1948 at the invitation of Dr. Large View We - meaning Hartree's group - had done what at the time was rated a large-scale calculation for Fuchs and Peierls, concerned with the atomic bomb project. Computing then was a completely different world from what it is now. computational services were needed all over the Establishment, these needs were going to grow rapidly and what was wanted was a service available to everyone. It may seem strange today that an enterprise so large and so technologically and scientifically sophisticated should have been planned without a central computing service, but remember, this was 30 years ago and the power and all-pervading nature of computation could not possibly have been realised at the time. This was before the U.K.A.E.A. had been created, when Harwell was still part of the Ministry of Supply. 2. Large View Large View 3. Large View
Jacquard loom This portrait of Jacquard was woven in silk on a Jacquard loom and required 24,000 punched cards to create (1839). It was only produced to order. Charles Babbage owned one of these portraits; it inspired him in using perforated cards in his analytical engine.[1] It is in the collection of the Science Museum in London, England.[2] It is based on earlier inventions by the Frenchmen Basile Bouchon (1725), Jean Baptiste Falcon (1728) and Jacques Vaucanson (1740)[6] A static display of a Jacquard loom is the centrepiece of the Musée des Tissus et des Arts décoratifs[7] in Lyon. Live displays of a Jacquard loom are available at a few private museums around Lyon and also twice a day at La Maison des Canuts, as well as at other locations around the world. Principles of operation[edit] The term "Jacquard loom" is somewhat inaccurate. Importance in computing[edit] The Jacquard head used replaceable punched cards to control a sequence of operations. See also[edit] Jacquard weaving References[edit]
Her Code Got Humans on the Moon—And Invented Software Itself Margaret Hamilton wasn’t supposed to invent the modern concept of software and land men on the moon. It was 1960, not a time when women were encouraged to seek out high-powered technical work. Hamilton, a 24-year-old with an undergrad degree in mathematics, had gotten a job as a programmer at MIT, and the plan was for her to support her husband through his three-year stint at Harvard Law. After that, it would be her turn—she wanted a graduate degree in math. But the Apollo space program came along. As a working mother in the 1960s, Hamilton was unusual; but as a spaceship programmer, Hamilton was positively radical. “People used to say to me, ‘How can you leave your daughter? Then, as now, “the guys” dominated tech and engineering. ‘When I first got into it, nobody knew what it was that we were doing. As Hamilton’s career got under way, the software world was on the verge of a giant leap, thanks to the Apollo program launched by John F. Advertisement ‘That would never happen’ But it did.
Moore's Law Cuil - Wikipedia Cuil (/ˈkuːl/ KOOL) was a search engine that organized web pages by content and displayed relatively long entries along with thumbnail pictures for many results. Cuil said it had a larger index than any other search engine, with about 120 billion web pages.[1] It went live on July 28, 2008.[1] Cuil's servers were shut down on September 17, 2010, with later confirmations the service had ended.[2][3][4] Cuil was managed and developed largely by former employees of Google, Anna Patterson and Russell Power. History[edit] Cuil launched in July 2008 with an index of 121,617,892,992 web pages.[9] About one month after launch, Cuil's Product VP and search technologist, Louis Monier, quit the company citing disagreements with the CEO, Tom Costello.[10] On December 19, 2008, BusinessWeek listed Cuil as one of the most successful U.S. startups of 2008, based on the amount of money they raised.[11] As of February, 2009, Cuil had 127 billion indexed pages. Shutdown[edit] Features[edit] Name[edit]