Computers – Invention of the Century

The biography of Computers only once in a lifetime will a wise invention come about to touch e real looking of our lives. untold(prenominal) devices changed the way we manage, work, and live. A machine that has d hotshot all this and to a greater extent instantaneously exists in nearly e really(prenominal) business in the coupled States. This unimagined invention is the figurer. The electronic figurer has been around for over a half-century, but its ancestors fall in been around for 2000 years. However, only in the last 40 years has the computing device changed American management to its greatest extent.From the first wooden abacus to the latest high- fixity microprocessor, the computer has changed nearly e truly feel of management, and our lives for the better. The very earliest existence of the modern day computers ancestor is the abacus. These date keep going to almost 2000 years ago (Dolotta, 1985). It is simply a wooden stuff holding parallel wires on which bea ds ar strung. When these beads argon moved a retentive the wire according to programming rules that the user must(prenominal) memorize. All ordinary arithmetic mathematical operations can be performed on the abacus. This was one of the first management tools apply.The next innovation in computers took seat in 1694 when Blaise Pascal invented the first digital calculating machine. It could only add up numbers and they had to be entered by turning dials. It was designed to help Pascals father, who was a tax collector, manage the t causes taxes (Beer, 1966). In the early 1800s, a maths professor named Charles Babbage designed an automatic calculation machine (Dolotta, 1985). It was steam powered and could retention up to 1000 50-digit numbers. Built in to his machine were operations that include everything a modern general-purpose computer would accept.It was programmed by and stored data on cards with holes punched in them, appropriately called punch cards. This machine was extremely utile to managers that delt with galactic volumes of good. With Babbages machine, managers could more(prenominal) easily calculate the banging numbers put in by inventories. The only problem was that there was only one of these machines built, consequently making it difficult for all managers to use (Beer, 1966). After Babbage, tribe began to move back interest in computers. However, between 1850 and 1900 there were great advances in mathematics and physics that began to re shapele the interest.M both of these impertinent advances involved complex calculations and formulas that were very time consuming for human race calculation. The first major use for a computer in the U. S. was during the 1890 census. Two men, Herman Hollerith and James Powers, developed a rising punched-card system that could automatically read information on cards without human (Dolotta, 1985). Since the population of the U. S. was increasing so troubled, the computer was an essential too l for managers in tabulating the totals (Hazewindus,1988).These profits were noted by commercial industries and soon led to the development of ameliorate punch-card business-machine systems by International Business Machines, Remington-Rand, Burroughs, and other corporations (Chposky, 1988). By modern threadbargons the punched-card machines were slow, typically processing from 50 to 250 cards per minute, with each card holding up to 80 digits. At the time, however, punched cards were an enormous step forward they provided a means of input, getup, and memory storage on a massive scale.For more than 50 years following their first use, punched-card machines did the bulk of the worlds business cypher (Jacobs, 1975). By the late 1930s punched-card machine techniques had become so strong established and reliable that Howard Hathaway Aiken, in collaboration with engineers at IBM, beneathtook construction of a large automatic digital computer based on standard IBM electromechanical p arts (Chposky, 1988). Aikens machine, called the Harvard Mark I, handled 23-digit numbers and could perform all quaternity arithmetic operations (Dolotta, 1985).Also, it had special built-in programs to handled logarithms and trigonometric functions. The Mark I was controlled from prepunched paper tape. Output was by card punch and electric typewriter. It was slow, requiring 3 to 5 seconds for a multiplication, but it was fully automatic and could complete long computations without human intervention. The outbreak of World War II produced a rattling(a) need for computing energy, in particular for the military (Dolotta, 1985). New weapons systems were produced which needed flying circuit boards and other essential data. In 1942, John P. Eckert, John W.Mauchley, and their associates at the University of public address system decided to build a high-speed electronic computer to do the job. This machine became know as ENIAC, for Electrical Numerical Integrator And electronic co mputer (Chposky, 1988). It could multiply two numbers at the rate of 300 products per second, by finding the value of each product from a multiplication table stored in its memory. ENIAC was thus about 1,000 times sportinger than the previous propagation of computers. ENIAC apply 18,000 standard vacuum tubes, occupied 1800 square feet of floor space, and used about 180,000 watts of electricity.It used punched-card input and output. The ENIAC was very difficult to program because one had to essentially re-wire it to perform whatever task he wanted the computer to do. It was economic in handling the particular programs for which it had been designed. ENIAC is generally accepted as the first successful high-speed electronic digital computer and was used in many applications from 1946 to 1955. However, the ENIAC was not glide slopeible to managers of businesses (Beer, 1966). Mathematician John Von Neumann was very interested in the ENIAC.In 1945 he undertook a theoretical ingest o f computation that demonstrated that a computer could have a very simple and yet be able to execute any kind of computation effectively by means of proper programmed control without the need for any changes in hardware. Von Neumann came up with incredible ideas for methods of building and organizing practical, fast computers. These ideas, which came to be referred to as the stored-program technique, became fundamental for future generations of high-speed digital computers and were universally adopted (Dolotta, 1985).The first wave of modern programmed electronic computers to take advantage of these mitigatements appeared in 1947. This group included computers using random access memory, RAM, which is a memory designed to give almost constant access to any particular piece of information (Dolotta, 1985). These machines had punched-card or punched-tape input and output devices and RAMs of 1000-word capacity. Physically, they were ofttimes more compact than ENIAC most were about the size of a grand piano and required 2500 small electron tubes. This was quite an improvement over the earlier machines.The first-generation stored-program computers required considerable maintenance, usually attained 70% to 80% reliable operation, and were used for 8 to 12 years (Hazewindus,1988). Typically, they were programmed directly in machine language, although by the mid- fifties progress had been made in several aspects of advance(a) programming. This group of machines included EDVAC and UNIVAC, the first commercially procurable computers. With this invention, managers had even more power to perform calculations for much(prenominal) things as statistical demographic data (Beer, 1966).Before this time, it was very rare for a manager of a large business to have the means to process large numbers in so little time. The UNIVAC was developed by John W. Mauchley and John Eckert, younger in the 1950s. Together they had formed the Mauchley-Eckert Computer Corporation, Americas f irst computer corporation in the 1940s. During the development of the UNIVAC, they began to run short on funds and change their company to the larger Remington-Rand Corporation. sluicetually they built a working UNIVAC computer. It was delivered to the U. S.census Bureau in 1951 where it was used to help tabulate the U. S. population (Hazewindus,1988). primeval in the 1950s two important engineering discoveries changed the electronic computer field. The first computers were made with vacuum tubes, but by the late 1950s computers were being made out of transistors, which were smaller, less expensive, more reliable, and more efficient (Dolotta, 1985). In 1959, Robert Noyce, a physicist at the Fairchild Semiconductor Corporation, invented the integrated circuit, a midget chip of silicon that contained an entire electronic circuit.Gone was the bulky, unreliable, but fast machine now computers began to become more compact, more reliable and have more capacity. These new technical di scoveries rapidly plunge their way into new models of digital computers. Memory storage capacities increased 800% in commercially available machines by the early 1960s and speeds increased by an equally large margin (Jacobs, 1975). These machines were very expensive to purchase or to rent and were especially expensive to operate because of the cost of hiring programmers to perform the complex operations the computers ran.Such computers were typically found in large computer centers operated by industry, government, and nonpublic laboratories staffed with many programmers and support personnel. By 1956, 76 of IBMs large computer mainframes were in use, compared with only 46 UNIVACs (Chposky, 1988). In the 1960s efforts to design and develop the instantaneous practical computers with the greatest capacity reached a turning point with the conclusion of the LARC machine for Livermore Radiation Laboratories by the Sperry-Rand Corporation, and the strain computer by IBM. The LARC ha d a core memory of 98,000 words and multiplied in 10 microseconds.Stretch was provided with several ranks of memory having slower access for the ranks of greater capacity, the fastest access time being less than 1 microseconds and the total capacity in the vicinity of 100 million words. During this time the major computer manufacturers began to offer a range of computer capabilities, as well as mingled computer-related equipment (Jacobs, 1975). These included input means such as consoles and card feeders output means such as page printers, cathode-ray-tube displays, and graphing devices and optional magnetic-tape and magnetic-disk file storage.These found childlike use in management for such applications as accounting, payroll, strain control, ordering supplies, and billing. Central processing units for such purposes did not need to be very fast arithmetically and were primarily used to access large amounts of records on file. The greatest number of computer systems were deliver ed for the larger applications, such as in hospitals for keeping track of patient records, medications, and treatments given.They were also used in automated library systems and in database systems such as the Chemical Abstracts system, where computer records now on file cover nearly all known chemical compounds (Dolotta, 1985). The trend during the seventies was, to some extent, away from extremely powerful, modify computational centers and toward a broader range of applications for less-costly computer systems (Jacobs, 1975). Most continuous-process manufacturing, such as petroleum refining and electrical-power distribution systems, began using computers of relatively modest capability for controlling and regulating their activities.In the 1960s the programming of applications problems was an obstacle to the self-reliance of moderate-sized on-site computer installations, but great advances in applications programming languages distant these obstacles. Applications languages beca me available for controlling a great range of manufacturing processes, for computer operation of machine tools, and for many other tasks. In 1971 Marcian E. Hoff, Jr. , an engineer at the Intel Corporation, invented the microprocessor and another stage in the development of the computer began.A new revolution in computer hardware was now well under way, involving miniaturization of computer-logic circuitry and of component manufacture by what are called large-scale integration techniques. In the 1950s it was realized that scaling down the size of electronic digital computer circuits and parts would increase speed and efficiency and improve performance. However, at that time the manufacturing methods were not good equal to accomplish such a task. About 1960, photoprinting of conductive circuit boards to eliminate wiring became passing developed.Then it became possible to build resistors and capacitors into the circuitry by photographic means. In the 1970s entire assemblies, such as adders, shifting registers, and counters, became available on bantam chips of silicon. In the 1980s very large scale integration, VLSI, in which hundreds of thousands of transistors are placed on a single chip, became increasingly common. Many companies, some new to the computer field, introduced in the 1970s programmable minicomputers supplied with software packages.The size-reduction trend go along with the introduction of personal computers, which are programmable machines small enough and inexpensive enough to be purchased and used by individuals. One of the first of such machines was introduced in January 1975. Popular Electronics magazine provided plans that would allow any electronics wizard to build his own small, programmable computer for about $380. The computer was called the Altair 8800. Its programming involved pushing buttons and flipping switches on the front of the box. It didnt include a monitor or keyboard, and its applications were very limited.Even though, man y orders came in for it and several famous owners of computer and software manufacturing companies got their bulge out in computing through the Altair. For example, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, founders of Apple Computer, built a much cheaper, yet more productive version of the Altair and turned their hobby into a business. After the introduction of the Altair 8800, the personal computer industry became a ferocious battleground of competition. IBM had been the computer industry standard for well over a half-century. They held their position as the standard when they introduced their first personal computer, the IBM Model 60 in 1975.However, the newly formed Apple Computer company was let go its own personal computer, the Apple II. The Apple I was the first computer designed by Jobs and Wozniak in Wozniaks garage, which was not produced on a wide scale. Software was needed to run the computers as well. Microsoft developed a criminal record Operating System, MS-DOS, for the IBM c omputer while Apple developed its own software. Because Microsoft had now set the software standard for IBMs, every software manufacturer had to befuddle their software compatible with Microsofts. This would lead to huge profits for Microsoft.The main design of the computer manufacturers was to make the computer as affordable as possible while increasing speed, reliability, and capacity. Nearly every computer manufacturer carry out this and computers popped up everywhere. Computers were in businesses keeping track of even more inventories for managers. Computers were in colleges aiding students in research. Computers were in laboratories making complex calculations at high speeds for scientists and physicists. The computer had made its mark everywhere in management and built up a huge industry. The future is promising for the computer industry and its technology.The speed of processors is expected to double every year and a half in the coming years. As manufacturing techniques ar e further perfected the prices of computer systems are expected to steadily fall. However, since the microprocessor technology will be increasing, its higher be will offset the drop in price of older processors. In other words, the price of a new computer will deterrent about the same from year to year, but technology will steadily increase. Since the end of World War II, the computer industry has grown from a standing start into one of the biggest and most profitable industries in the join States.It now comprises thousands of companies, making everything from multi-million dollar high-speed supercomputers to printout paper and floppy disks. It employs millions of people and generates tens of billions of dollars in sales each year. Surely, the computer has impacted every aspect of peoples lives. It has affected the way people work and play. It has made everyones life easier by doing difficult work for people. The computer truly is one of the most incredible inventions in history to ever influence management, and life.