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Feb. 12Th Typical Programs Involved the Kurzweil Calculation of Differential Equations in Small Steps, but This Born: Feb

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Feb. 12Th Typical Programs Involved the Kurzweil Calculation of Differential Equations in Small Steps, but This Born: Feb with the ENIAC engineers, such as Arthur Burks [Oct 13]. Raymond C. Feb. 12th Typical programs involved the Kurzweil calculation of differential equations in small steps, but this Born: Feb. 12, 1948; Jacques Herbrand was complicated by the ENIAC’s Queens, New York Born: Feb. 12, 1908; ability to perform multiple Kurzweil is a well-known operations simultaneously, and Paris, France advocate for the futurist and the need for each piece of data Died: July 27, 1931 trans-humanist movements and instruction to reach the [March 30], and also a prolific Although Herbrand died when correct location in the circuitry inventor. He developed the first he was only 23 years old (in a inside a time interval of 1/5000 CCD flatbed scanner, the first mountain climbing accident), he omni-font optical character was already considered one of recognition software (1974), the the greatest mathematicians of first print-to-speech reading his generation. He worked machine for the blind (1976), primarily in the areas of the first commercial text-to- mathematical logic, but also had speech synthesizer (1996), and a significant influential on the the first commercially marketed development of recursive large-vocabulary speech functions. recognition system (1987). In 1934 when Kurt Gödel [April In 1965, he appeared on the CBS 28] introduced the notion of TV show “I’ve Got a Secret”, general recursive functions, he where he performed a piano noted that this idea had been piece that had been written by a suggested to him in the letter Kay McNulty (1938). Her high relay-based computer he had from Herbrand dated April 7, school graduation picture. built. The machine later earned 1931. Herbrand had visited him first prize in an Berlin at the start of 1931; he th of a second. As a result, it International Science Fair. had worked with John von would often take one or two Neumann [Dec 28] on logic, and days to set the machine up for a In the 1990's, he started a had learnt of Gödel's new problem, via plug website featuring software to incompleteness theorem from rearrangments and switches. assist the creative process, him. including “Ray Kurzweil’s McNulty became involved in Cybernetic Poet”. 1942 after seeing a civil service ad in The Philadelphia Inquirer His book “The Age of Spiritual looking for women with degrees Machines” (1999) argued that Kathleen (Kay) in mathematics. Her eventual computer technology would civil service title was soon allow machines to operate McNulty Mauchly “computer.” on a level equivalent to that of Antonelli the human brain. In “The Before her assignment to the Singularity Is Near” (2005) he ENIAC, she worked with the considered the moment when Born: Feb. 12, 1921; differential analyser [July 23] County Donegal, Ireland machine intelligence would located in the Moore School's surpass that of humans. The family emigrated to the US basement, the most in Oct. 1924. sophisticated analogue Douglas Hofstadter [Feb 15] has Died: April 20, 2006 mechanical calculator of the said of Kurzweil’s and Hans McNulty was one of the six time. Her obvious skill meant Moravec’s [Nov 30] books: “It’s original programmers of the she was chosen to receive an intimate mixture of rubbish ENIAC [Feb 15] (the so-called training at the Aberdeen Proving and good ideas, and it’s very “Refrigerator Ladies” [May 00]), Grounds on the equipment used hard to disentangle the two, although this was before the with the ENIAC. because these are smart people; they’re not stupid.” modern meaning of On Feb. 7, 1948, McNulty "programming" had been married John Mauchly [Aug 30]., A quote: “Does God exist? I coined. and joined him at EMCC [Dec 8] would say, ‘Not yet.’” Nevertheless, the group was where she worked on the tasked with devising the software for the BINAC [April 4] sequence of steps that the ENIAC and UNIVAC I [March 31]; the had to perform to solve a hardware that had been Ferranti Mark 1 problem. They did this without designed by her husband. Feb. 12, 1951 manuals, although they were given the ENIAC’s schematics, The Ferranti Mark 1, arguably and could occasionally consult the world’s first commercially 1 available general-purpose Today's Mark 1’s delivery date experiment was repeated in electronic computer, was beat the UNIVAC I, which was Cambodia. delivered to University of ‘turned over’ to the US Census Concerns were raised about the Manchester. Bureau on [March 31] 1951. In long-term maintainability of the any case, the UNIVAC wasn’t As the name suggests, it was devices, unless they were actually delivered to the bureau based on the Manchester Mark I until Dec. 1952. located in a school environment, [June 16], designed by Frederick and some people dubbed the Williams [June 26] and Tom Conway Berners-Lee and Mary project: The "Dump hardware in Kilburn [Aug 11], although it had Lee Woods, the parents of Tim schools, hope for magic to been built by Ferranti [Feb 27]. Berners-Lee [June 8], both happen" Plan. worked on the Ferranti Mark 1 The computer was big, and its successor, the Mark 1*. consisting of two large bays, Mary Lee recalled that there was each 5 meters long, 2.4 meters a big notice over the computer: The Boston high, and 1 meter wide, with a “Think, but not here!,” an control desk at one end. Inside obvious reference to IBM’s Computer Society were 4,000 vacuum tubes, 2,500 dictum [Feb 14]. capacitors, 15,000 resistors, and Feb. 12, 1977 nearly 10 km of wiring. Ferranti sold nine Mark 1/1*s The Boston Computer Society between 1951 and 1957 (and The main improvements over (BCS) was a PC users one or two more to secret organization that was founded the Mark I were in its storage government agencies). Three capacity, a faster multiplier, and on this day, and remained active were sold to Canada, Holland, support for more instructions. until Sept. 1996, a few months and Italy. One new command was "hoot" short of its 20th anniversary. which let the machine give Although the Mark 1 is usually It was set up by 13-year-old auditory feedback. The sound called the world’s first Jonathan Rotenberg and Richard could be altered in pitch, a commercially available Gardner, with Rotenberg feature later exploited by computer, there were two sales becoming its president from Christopher Strachey [Nov 16] that predate it – the BINAC 1977 to 1990. The first meeting to have the Mark 1 play a [April 4] to Northrop in Sept. was held in the library at medley of tunes including “God 1949, and the Konrad Zuse’s Z4 Rotenberg’s high school, and Save the King”, “Baa Baa Black [July 11], which was delivered to two people showed up. Sheep”, and “In the Mood”. The ETH-Zurich in July 1950. BBC made a recording of these However multiple Mark 1's were melodies at the end of 1951, sold. making the tape the earliest known recording of computer- generated music. However, the Mark 1 wasn't the first machine Sugata Mitra with musical skills; CSIRAC, Born: Feb. 12, 1952; Australia’s first digital computer, Calcutta, West Bengal may have achieved that with a rendition of “Colonel Bogey” on Mitra's “Hole in the Wall” (HIW) [Aug 7] 1951, or perhaps the project made basic computers BINAC [April 4] was first with available at remote places to "For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow." show that people in small villages, especially children, In Nov. 1951, Dietrich Prinz could teach themselves about wrote one of the first games for Jonathan Rotenberg computing without formal the Mark 1, for playing chess (2011). Own photo. CC training. Mitra called this [June 25]. Hardware limitations BY-SA 4.0. Minimally Invasive Education didn’t allow a whole game to be (MIE), and believed: “In nine implemented, only mate-in-two Nevertheless, the BCS grew to months, a group of children left problems. Typically a solution become the largest users group alone with a computer in any could be found after 15–20 in the world, with over 30,000 language will reach the same minutes of processing. members in the US and 40 other standard as an office secretary countries. At its peak in the early Programming initially required in the West.” 1990's, it supported over 75 the mastery of base 32, but Alick The first experiment, in 1999, special interest groups and held Glennie [June 00] and Tony placed a computer in a kiosk in a more than 150 monthly Brooker developed Mark I poor part of Kalkaji, Delhi and meetings. Autocode in 1952-1955 [Dec children were allowed to use it 14], which most programmers Notable firsts for the society freely; the trial was quickly came to prefer even though it included Dan Bricklin [July 16] expanded to over 20 kiosks slowed the machine down and Bob Frankston [June 14] across rural India. In 2004 the considerably. demonstrating VisiCalc [Oct 19] 2 in 1979, Steve Jobs [Feb 24] and Steve Wozniak [Aug 11] showing Google Groups off the Macintosh [Jan 24] in 1984, and Mitch Kapor [Nov 1] Released test-driving Lotus 1-2-3 [Jan 26]. Feb. 12, 2001 Google Groups grew from Google’s purchase of DejaNews’ Wing Commander USENET [Jan 29] archive, with the addition of older mailing Feb. 12, 1996 lists [June 7] lovingly collected Electronic Arts released the by Henry Spencer [?? 1955] and space simulation game “Wing donated by the University of Commander IV: The Price of Western Ontario. The earliest Freedom”.
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