A Brief History of Computers,

Computing and Programming

CECS-105
Module 3

Forouzan Golshani

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Before modern computers
Cylindrical slide rules

$500 in 1850s
Equivalent to 60 ft
Slide rule of linear slide rule

Mechanical
adding machine Electromechanical
adding machines
Abacus

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A historical view of computing
• Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) developed a formal logic based on the binary numeral
system in which ones and zeros represent true and false values or on and off states. George Boole
(1854) introduced Boolean algebra representing the computational processes for binary systems.
• Charles Babbage (1791-1871) conceived the idea of a programmable computer. Working with
him, Ada Lovelace (1815-52) was the designer of one of the first computer algorithms – for
computing Bernoulli numbers.
• Charles Peirce (1839-1914), described how logical operations could be carried out by electrical
switching circuits.
• Alan Turing (1912-54) developed a mathematical model for computing, which became the
foundation for theory of computer science. He, along with Alonzo Church (1903-95), formalized
the concept of algorithm and defined the limits on what can be computed.
In 1936, Turing published his seminal work on the Turing machines, an abstract digital computing
machine that embodied the principles of the modern computer, including the concept of “stored
program” that almost all modern-day computers use.
• John von Neumann (1903-57) introduced a hardware architecture known as Von Neumann
architecture, introducing such concepts as memory and a Reduced Instruction Set Computing
(RISC) with 21 instructions to perform all tasks.

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History of Computers
• The term referred to persons who did calculations… Usually women.
• Charles Babbage built a mechanical computer called the “Difference Machine” that
embodied his invention.
• Herman Hollerith (1860-1929) invented an electromechanical punched card machine for
tabulating data. The machine was effective in summarizing data and, later, in accounting.
He founded a company, which after merging with several other companies, in 1924, was
renamed "International Business Machines" (IBM).
• Turing built a version of his theoretical machine, called Bombe, during WW2. Because of
extreme secrecy, this machine did not receive any recognition until 1970 when the war
documents became public.
• The first programmable general-purpose electronic digital computer was ENIAC, built by
John Mauchly, Presper Eckert and others in 1946 for the US Navy. The commercial
version, called UNIVAC I (Universal Automatic Computer) was mass produced in 1951.
• Computing, as we know it, took off after the invention of transistors by William Shockley
in Bell Labs.

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History of Programming Languages
• Ada Lovelace working with Charles Babbage on the Analytical Engine
(a primitive mechanical computer) developed the first programming
language in 1883. Babbage designed the machine, but it was Lovelace
who was able to write the instructions that the machine executed.
Lovelace is credited for her ability to discern the importance
of numbers, and the fact that they may represent more than
just numerical values of phenomena.
• Assembly Language, a type of low-level language, was developed in 1949,
consisting of instructions that only machines could understand.
Currently, assembly language is used sparsely in real-time programs and in
hardware-software co-design. Unfortunately, it is also used to create computer
viruses.
• The concept of compiled computer programming languages was introduced in
1952 under the name Autocode.
COBOL and Fortran are sometimes referred to as Autocode languages.

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History of Programming Languages
• Fortran was designed in 1957 by John Backus at IBM, initially for numeric computation and
scientific computing.
In the 1960s and 1970s, much of the non-financial software was written in Fortran, including the
original software of NASA probes voyager-1 and voyager-2.
• ALGOL, standing for ALGOrithmic Language, was developed in 1958-60 with a few features that
didn’t exist in Fortran, e.g., nested functions and code blocks that used “begin” and “end”.
Many subsequent programming languages have their roots in ALGOL, including Pascal, C, C++, and
Java.
• COBOL (COmmon Business-Oriented Language) was introduced in 1959 as a computer language
with English-like syntax. It was universally used for developing business, finance and
administrative systems.
As late as 2000, some 80% of the world’s business systems ran on COBOL code. Internal Revenue
Service used a COBOL-based IMF (Individual Master File) in order to pay out the tens of millions
of coronavirus relief payments.
• Basic, standing for Beginners All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code, was introduced in 1964, with
some resemblance to Fortran. Bill Gates and Paul Allen used Basic for microcomputers in their
newly-formed company, Microsoft.
Microsoft released Visual Basic, an updated version of Basic, in 1991.

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History of Programming Languages - continued
• In 1972, C was introduced as a general-purpose programming language and
soon became the most popular programming language. Much of the code
that was previously written in assembly language for such things as
operating systems and kernels was recoded in the C language. It is also
used for embedded systems, Common Gateway Interface (CGI), and others.
C has influenced virtually all modern higher-level programming languages,
including C#, D, Go, Java, JavaScript, Perl, PHP, Python, and Unix’s C shell.
• Other popular languages: C++ (1983), Python (1991), Java, Java Script
(1995), and C# (2000).
• Many other non-procedural languages have been developed:
• LISP, a functional programming language developed by John McCarthy in 1958. (It’s
the second oldest language after Fortran)
• Haskal, a purely functional language developed in 1990.

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 Input and Output

14 7/8 x 11 perforated sheets

Punch cards: Used until the early 1980s

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Tape technology
• Perforated paper tapes have been in use since mid-18th century. Paper
tapes were expensive to create, fragile, and difficult to repair.
• Tape drives are a type of data storage device that can read and write data
on a magnetic tape. They are favored due to low unit cost and a long
archival stability for offline, archival data storage.

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Disk Drives
• The first magnetic disk storage, which retrieved data without much
delay, was introduced by IBM in 1956. It had 50 vertically stacked
hard disks quoted with magnetic paint. Weighing over a ton, it could
hold 5 MB of data.

IBM’s RAMAC hard drive, 1956

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Portable disks
• IBM made the first floppy disks in early 1960s with a diameter of 8 inches.
In mid-1970s, the 5¼-inch was introduced. This was replaced in early 1980s
by the 3½-inch type which became the standard issue on all desktops.
• Most commonly used floppy disks were the 3.5 inch type, with
a standard capacity of 1.44 MB. (The
defined capacity range was between
800 KB and 2.8 MB).
• A variety of other products were
introduced in the 1990s, including
Zip drives (100 MB to 750MB), and
Jaz drive (up to 2GB).
© Copyright Forouzan Golshani