Docsity
Docsity

Prepare for your exams
Prepare for your exams

Study with the several resources on Docsity


Earn points to download
Earn points to download

Earn points by helping other students or get them with a premium plan


Guidelines and tips
Guidelines and tips

History of Computers: From Abacus to Fifth Generation - Prof. Maurya, Summaries of Computer Fundamentals

Computer basics/types of computer/hardware and software and more

Typology: Summaries

2021/2022

Available from 12/26/2022

Vedmaurya
Vedmaurya 🇮🇳

2 documents

1 / 3

Toggle sidebar

This page cannot be seen from the preview

Don't miss anything!

bg1
History of Computers
The first counting device was used by the primitive people. They used sticks,
stones and bones as counting tools. As human mind and technology
improved with time more computing devices were developed. Some of the
popular computing devices starting with the first to recent ones are
described below;
Abacus
The history of computer begins with the birth of abacus which is believed to
be the first computer. It is said that Chinese invented Abacus around 4,000
years ago.
It was a wooden rack which has metal rods with beads mounted on them.
The beads were moved by the abacus operator according to some rules to
perform arithmetic calculations. Abacus is still used in some countries like
China, Russia and Japan. An image of this tool is shown below;
Napier's Bones
It was a manually-operated calculating device which was invented by John
Napier (1550-1617) of Merchiston. In this calculating tool, he used 9 different
ivory strips or bones marked with numbers to multiply and divide. So, the
tool became known as "Napier's Bones. It was also the first machine to use
the decimal point.
Pascaline
Pascaline is also known as Arithmetic Machine or Adding Machine. It was
invented between 1642 and 1644 by a French mathematician-philosopher
Biaise Pascal. It is believed that it was the first mechanical and automatic
calculator.
Pascal invented this machine to help his father, a tax accountant. It could
only perform addition and subtraction. It was a wooden box with a series of
gears and wheels. When a wheel is rotated one revolution, it rotates the
neighboring wheel. A series of windows is given on the top of the wheels to
read the totals.
pf3

Partial preview of the text

Download History of Computers: From Abacus to Fifth Generation - Prof. Maurya and more Summaries Computer Fundamentals in PDF only on Docsity!

History of Computers

The first counting device was used by the primitive people. They used sticks, stones and bones as counting tools. As human mind and technology improved with time more computing devices were developed. Some of the popular computing devices starting with the first to recent ones are described below;

Abacus

The history of computer begins with the birth of abacus which is believed to be the first computer. It is said that Chinese invented Abacus around 4, years ago. It was a wooden rack which has metal rods with beads mounted on them. The beads were moved by the abacus operator according to some rules to perform arithmetic calculations. Abacus is still used in some countries like China, Russia and Japan. An image of this tool is shown below;

Napier's Bones

It was a manually-operated calculating device which was invented by John Napier (1550-1617) of Merchiston. In this calculating tool, he used 9 different ivory strips or bones marked with numbers to multiply and divide. So, the tool became known as "Napier's Bones. It was also the first machine to use the decimal point.

Pascaline

Pascaline is also known as Arithmetic Machine or Adding Machine. It was invented between 1642 and 1644 by a French mathematician-philosopher Biaise Pascal. It is believed that it was the first mechanical and automatic calculator. Pascal invented this machine to help his father, a tax accountant. It could only perform addition and subtraction. It was a wooden box with a series of gears and wheels. When a wheel is rotated one revolution, it rotates the neighboring wheel. A series of windows is given on the top of the wheels to read the totals.

Stepped Reckoner or Leibnitz wheel

It was developed by a German mathematician-philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz in 1673. He improved Pascal's invention to develop this machine. It was a digital mechanical calculator which was called the stepped reckoner as instead of gears it was made of fluted drums.

Analytical Engine

This calculating machine was also developed by Charles Babbage in 1830. It was a mechanical computer that used punch-cards as input. It was capable of solving any mathematical problem and storing information as a permanent memory.

Tabulating Machine

It was invented in 1890, by Herman Hollerith, an American statistician. It was a mechanical tabulator based on punch cards. It could tabulate statistics and record or sort data or information. This machine was used in the 1890 U.S. Census. Hollerith also started the Hollerith?s Tabulating Machine Company which later became International Business Machine (IBM) in 1924.

Differential Analyzer

It was the first electronic computer introduced in the United States in 1930. It was an analog device invented by Vannevar Bush. This machine has vacuum tubes to switch electrical signals to perform calculations. It could do 25 calculations in few minutes.

Mark I

The next major changes in the history of computer began in 1937 when Howard Aiken planned to develop a machine that could perform calculations involving large numbers. In 1944, Mark I computer was built as a partnership between IBM and Harvard. It was the first programmable digital computer.

Fifth Generation Computers

In fifth generation (1980-till date) computers, the VLSI technology was replaced with ULSI (Ultra Large Scale Integration). It made possible the production of microprocessor chips with ten million electronic components. This generation computers used parallel processing hardware and AI