Generations of computing technology - ANSWER generation 0 (1642-1945,
mechanical devices [gears, relays])
generation 1 (1945-1954, vacuum tubes)
generation 2 (1954-1963, transistors)
generation 3 (1963-1973, integrated circuits)
generation 4 (1973-1985, very large scale integration)
generation 5 (1985-?, parallel processing and networking)
Generation 0: Mechanical Computers - ANSWER 1642: Pascal built a
mechanical calculating machine which used mechanical gears, a hand crank,
dials and knobs. other similar machines followed.
1805: Jacquard's loom, the first programmable device (it used punch cards,
which represented the pattern and were fed into the loom. This allowed for the
mass production of tapestries
mid 1800's: Babbages "analytical engine", its design expands on mechanical
calculators and was programmable via punch cards like Jacquard's loom. His
design was beyond the technology of his day, but he described the general
layout of modern computers
1930's: computers built with relays. MARK I followed the basic design of
Baggage, limited capabilities by modern standards: could store only 72
numbers, required 1/10 sec to add, 6 sec to multiply but was still much faster
than previous technology
generation 0: relays - ANSWER an electromagnetic relay is a switch which
can be opened or closed via electric current
they were used extensively in early telephones
Generation 1: Vacuum Tubes - ANSWER -mid 1940s: vacuum tubes replaces
relays.
a vacuum tube is a light bulb containing a partial vacuum to speed electron
flow. they could control the flow of electricity faster than relays since they had
no moving parts.
-1940's: hybrid computers using vacuum tubes and relays were built
,-COLOSSUS 1943: first "electronic computer", built by the British govt. (based
on designs by Alan Turing) used to decode Nazi information during the second
world war
-ENIAC 1946: first publicly-acknowledged "electronic computer", built by
Eckert & Mauchly (UPenn), used vacuum tubes and relays
-COLOSSUS and ENIAC were not general purpose computers, they could only
do one kind of computation
-Von Neumann Arcitecture
Von Neumann Architecture - ANSWER -Stored-program computers
-has three parts, memory, CPU, and I/O
-memory stores both data and programs
-Central Processing Unit (CPU) executes by loading program instructions from
memory and executing them in sequence
-Input/Output devices allow for interaction with the user
-virtually all machines follow this architecture
-programming was difficult and tedious because each machine had its own
machine language, 0's & 1's corresponding to the settings of physical
components. But, this was made easier because in 1950's, assembly languages
replaced 0's & 1's with mnemonic names
Generation 2: Transistors - ANSWER -mid 1950's- transistors begin to replace
vacuum tubes
-prompted by the space race
-transistors were cheaper to produce than switches, so as prices dropped,
computers became commercialized
-with computer commercialization, high level languages popped up to make
programming more natural
-a computer industry and business grew (IBM in 1960's)
transistors - ANSWER -a transistor is a piece of silicon whose conductivity
can be turned on and off using an electric current
-solid state, no moving parts and not easily breakable
-they performed the same switching function of vacuum tubes, but were
smaller, faster, more reliable, and cheaper to mass produce
-some historians claim the transistor was the most important invention of the
20th century
,early "calculators" - ANSWER were women!
Katherine Johnson worked at NACA (and then NASA as a mathematician doing
complex calculations by hand. It was a common job in math- heavy industries
like aerospace, insurance, and the government
Generation 3: Integrated Circuits - ANSWER -mid 1960's: integrated circuits
(IC) were produced (a way to package transistors and circuitry on a silicon
chip.) this advance was made possible by miniaturization & improved
manufacturing and allowed for the mass production of circuitry
-1971-Intel marketed the first microprocessor, the 4004, a chip
with all the circuitry for a calculator
-1960's saw the rise of operating systems
-as computers became affordable to small businesses, specialized programming
languages were developed (pascal and C)
integrated circuit - ANSWER A group of tiny transistors and electric wires
built on a silicon wafer, or chip.
A thin slice of silicon that contains many solid-state components.
operating system - ANSWER -An operating system is a collection of programs
that manage peripheral devices and other resources
-in the 60's, operating systems enabled time-sharing, where users share a
computer by swapping jobs in and out
generation 4: VLSI - ANSWER -late 1970's- Very Large Scale Integration
-by the late 1970's, manufacturing advances allowed placing hundreds of
thousands of transistors w/ circuitry on a chip
-this "very large scale integration" resulted in mass-produced microprocessors
and other useful IC's
-since computers could be constructed by simply connecting powerful IC's and
peripheral devices, they were easier to make and more affordable
-with VLSI came the rise of personal computing (1975 Microsoft, 1977 Apple,
1980 IBM PC, 1984 Apple Macintosh, 1985 Windows)
-1980s- object oriented programming began
object oriented programming - ANSWER designing a program by discovering
objects, their properties, and their relationships
, -represented a new approach to program design which views a program as a
collection of interacting software objects that model real-world entities
generation 5: parallelism and networks - ANSWER -there is no new switching
technologies, but there has been a change in computer usage.
-parallell processing has become widespread. multi-core processors provide
simple parallelism, can spread jobs across cores. High end machines like web
servers can have multiple CPUs.
-most computers today are networked. (the Internet traces its roots to the 1969
ARPANet, but it was mainly used by government & universities until the late
80s/early 90s)
-the web was invented in 1989 to allow physics researchers to share data
-almost nothing has changes in 50 years of computing; the main thing is that the
devices are faster
the basic components of digital electronics, including computers, is -
ANSWER a simple switch
just like a light switch, an electronic switch has two states: on and off
switches are combined into circuits to do useful things
computers can do limited things, including - ANSWER -store and retrieve
numbers in memory
-add numbers together
-shift numbers left and right
all other things are a special case of those three functions, however...for
example, a computer subtracts by adding
by combining switches into circuits, we can do pretty much any mathematical
calculation we might need
why do we have binary - ANSWER Because switches only have two states, on
and off, we use a numbering system that has only two values, 0 and 1 (zero and
one)
every decimal can be represented in binary form
-All the numbers, text, graphics, and so on in your computer are stored and
manipulated in binary, then converted for display to something we humans can
read
bit - ANSWER A binary digit, a 0 or a 1.
mechanical devices [gears, relays])
generation 1 (1945-1954, vacuum tubes)
generation 2 (1954-1963, transistors)
generation 3 (1963-1973, integrated circuits)
generation 4 (1973-1985, very large scale integration)
generation 5 (1985-?, parallel processing and networking)
Generation 0: Mechanical Computers - ANSWER 1642: Pascal built a
mechanical calculating machine which used mechanical gears, a hand crank,
dials and knobs. other similar machines followed.
1805: Jacquard's loom, the first programmable device (it used punch cards,
which represented the pattern and were fed into the loom. This allowed for the
mass production of tapestries
mid 1800's: Babbages "analytical engine", its design expands on mechanical
calculators and was programmable via punch cards like Jacquard's loom. His
design was beyond the technology of his day, but he described the general
layout of modern computers
1930's: computers built with relays. MARK I followed the basic design of
Baggage, limited capabilities by modern standards: could store only 72
numbers, required 1/10 sec to add, 6 sec to multiply but was still much faster
than previous technology
generation 0: relays - ANSWER an electromagnetic relay is a switch which
can be opened or closed via electric current
they were used extensively in early telephones
Generation 1: Vacuum Tubes - ANSWER -mid 1940s: vacuum tubes replaces
relays.
a vacuum tube is a light bulb containing a partial vacuum to speed electron
flow. they could control the flow of electricity faster than relays since they had
no moving parts.
-1940's: hybrid computers using vacuum tubes and relays were built
,-COLOSSUS 1943: first "electronic computer", built by the British govt. (based
on designs by Alan Turing) used to decode Nazi information during the second
world war
-ENIAC 1946: first publicly-acknowledged "electronic computer", built by
Eckert & Mauchly (UPenn), used vacuum tubes and relays
-COLOSSUS and ENIAC were not general purpose computers, they could only
do one kind of computation
-Von Neumann Arcitecture
Von Neumann Architecture - ANSWER -Stored-program computers
-has three parts, memory, CPU, and I/O
-memory stores both data and programs
-Central Processing Unit (CPU) executes by loading program instructions from
memory and executing them in sequence
-Input/Output devices allow for interaction with the user
-virtually all machines follow this architecture
-programming was difficult and tedious because each machine had its own
machine language, 0's & 1's corresponding to the settings of physical
components. But, this was made easier because in 1950's, assembly languages
replaced 0's & 1's with mnemonic names
Generation 2: Transistors - ANSWER -mid 1950's- transistors begin to replace
vacuum tubes
-prompted by the space race
-transistors were cheaper to produce than switches, so as prices dropped,
computers became commercialized
-with computer commercialization, high level languages popped up to make
programming more natural
-a computer industry and business grew (IBM in 1960's)
transistors - ANSWER -a transistor is a piece of silicon whose conductivity
can be turned on and off using an electric current
-solid state, no moving parts and not easily breakable
-they performed the same switching function of vacuum tubes, but were
smaller, faster, more reliable, and cheaper to mass produce
-some historians claim the transistor was the most important invention of the
20th century
,early "calculators" - ANSWER were women!
Katherine Johnson worked at NACA (and then NASA as a mathematician doing
complex calculations by hand. It was a common job in math- heavy industries
like aerospace, insurance, and the government
Generation 3: Integrated Circuits - ANSWER -mid 1960's: integrated circuits
(IC) were produced (a way to package transistors and circuitry on a silicon
chip.) this advance was made possible by miniaturization & improved
manufacturing and allowed for the mass production of circuitry
-1971-Intel marketed the first microprocessor, the 4004, a chip
with all the circuitry for a calculator
-1960's saw the rise of operating systems
-as computers became affordable to small businesses, specialized programming
languages were developed (pascal and C)
integrated circuit - ANSWER A group of tiny transistors and electric wires
built on a silicon wafer, or chip.
A thin slice of silicon that contains many solid-state components.
operating system - ANSWER -An operating system is a collection of programs
that manage peripheral devices and other resources
-in the 60's, operating systems enabled time-sharing, where users share a
computer by swapping jobs in and out
generation 4: VLSI - ANSWER -late 1970's- Very Large Scale Integration
-by the late 1970's, manufacturing advances allowed placing hundreds of
thousands of transistors w/ circuitry on a chip
-this "very large scale integration" resulted in mass-produced microprocessors
and other useful IC's
-since computers could be constructed by simply connecting powerful IC's and
peripheral devices, they were easier to make and more affordable
-with VLSI came the rise of personal computing (1975 Microsoft, 1977 Apple,
1980 IBM PC, 1984 Apple Macintosh, 1985 Windows)
-1980s- object oriented programming began
object oriented programming - ANSWER designing a program by discovering
objects, their properties, and their relationships
, -represented a new approach to program design which views a program as a
collection of interacting software objects that model real-world entities
generation 5: parallelism and networks - ANSWER -there is no new switching
technologies, but there has been a change in computer usage.
-parallell processing has become widespread. multi-core processors provide
simple parallelism, can spread jobs across cores. High end machines like web
servers can have multiple CPUs.
-most computers today are networked. (the Internet traces its roots to the 1969
ARPANet, but it was mainly used by government & universities until the late
80s/early 90s)
-the web was invented in 1989 to allow physics researchers to share data
-almost nothing has changes in 50 years of computing; the main thing is that the
devices are faster
the basic components of digital electronics, including computers, is -
ANSWER a simple switch
just like a light switch, an electronic switch has two states: on and off
switches are combined into circuits to do useful things
computers can do limited things, including - ANSWER -store and retrieve
numbers in memory
-add numbers together
-shift numbers left and right
all other things are a special case of those three functions, however...for
example, a computer subtracts by adding
by combining switches into circuits, we can do pretty much any mathematical
calculation we might need
why do we have binary - ANSWER Because switches only have two states, on
and off, we use a numbering system that has only two values, 0 and 1 (zero and
one)
every decimal can be represented in binary form
-All the numbers, text, graphics, and so on in your computer are stored and
manipulated in binary, then converted for display to something we humans can
read
bit - ANSWER A binary digit, a 0 or a 1.
