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Jacquard's Portrait a Logic Named Joe Harvard Mark I Manual Published Popular Mechanics Predicts Weight

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Jacquard's Portrait a Logic Named Joe Harvard Mark I Manual Published Popular Mechanics Predicts Weight out during parties to illustrate Calculator” which included the his plans for the Analytical earliest published examples of March Engine [Dec 23] (which would digital computer programs, in use punched cards). These this case for the Harvard Mark I soirees were held on Saturdays [Aug 7]. during the ‘season’ in London, Jacquard’s Portrait The report also represents the lasting from late March until the March 1840 end of July. We know that first extended analysis of programs since Ada Lovelace’s Babbage talked about the [Dec 10] “Sketch of the In Lyon, sometime during 1838, picture at one in March 1840, Analytical Engine Invented by Michel-Marie Carquillat wove a which is the reason for placing Charles Babbage . with Notes portrait of Joseph-Marie this entry here. Jacquard [July 7] in silk on a by the Translator” [July 10]. Jacquard loom. The machine Aiken liked to see himself as employed 24,000 cards, each Babbage’s successor, and the containing over 1000 holes. A Logic Named Joe document included a section March 1946 placing the Mark I in this historical context. Aiken had “A Logic Named Joe” is a sci-fi included something similar in short story by Murray Leinster his ASCC proposal [Jan 17]. published in the March 1946 issue of Astounding Science Hopper was the main author of Fiction. The story appeared chapters 1-3 and eight under Leinster’s real name, appendices. Chapters 4 and 5 William Fitzgerald Jenkins. were written by Aiken and Robert Campbell, and chapter 6, It details a world where containing directions for solving computers, called “Logics”, are sample problems on the connected to a vast repository of machine, was the work of data called the "tank". Every Brooks J. Lockhart and Hopper. home is equipped with a Logic that serves as a reference Campbell oversaw the move of source, entertainment console, the ASCC to Harvard in Feb. and communication device. 1944, and programmed and ran the first problems on the One such Logic, called Joe, machine. The other war-time begins to malfunction, becoming programmer was Richard Bloch. "A la mémoire de J.M. Jacquard", self-aware, and resolving to Michel-Marie Carquillat provide his owners with Aiken and Hopper followed the (tisseur). whatever information they manual’s publication with three require, even the stuff which is articles in Electrical Engineering Jacquard is shown sitting in usually restricted via “censor- in issues 8, 10, and 11 in 1946. front of a work bench, holding a circuits”. This small revolt They summarized the Mark I’s pair of calipers against some encourages other Logics to start features, and included a few punch card strips. A model of his providing useful tips, such as example algorithms. loom is on the table. how to cover up drinking binges, As per usual, not every historian The original picture was an oil rob banks, and poison spouses. agrees that this manual portrait by Claude Bonnefond, Only when Joe is taken offline is represents the first publication and Carquillat took several order restored. on programming a digital months to convert it into The Computer History Museum computer. Some point to “A punched cards since the image [Sept 24] has called the story Tentative Instruction Code for a contains some tricky elements “one of the most prescient views Statistical EDVAC” from 1947, such as a translucent curtain. of the capabilities of computers which describes the instruction After "programming" was in a network.” set for the UNIVAC [March 31]. completed, the weaving For the first textbook on probably took eight hours. All computing, see [May 00]. this for a picture that's just 55 x 34 cm, minus the border. Harvard Mark I Ten copies are known to exist, Manual Published including ones at the Popular Mechanics Metropolitan Museum of Art, the March 1946 Science Museum in London, the Predicts Weight Chicago Art Institute, and the Howard Aiken [March 8] and March 1949 Computer History Museum [Sept Grace Hopper [Dec 9] published 24]. Charles Babbage [Dec 26] “A Manual of Operation for the A good example of a computing owned a copy which he brought Automatic Sequence Controlled prediction that turned out to be 1 wildly inaccurate appeared in cost just $60,000, or was fitted with a gold-plated front the March 1949 issue of Popular available at the low-low monthly panel. Mechanics: rent of just $1,485. Running costs were also less since the G- “Where a calculator like ENIAC 15 ran Intercom 1000 (a [Feb 15] today is equipped with primitive OS) which meant that UNIVAC LARC 18,000 vacuum tubes and it didn’t need a dedicated weighs 30 tons, computers in operator. Delivered the future may have only 1,000 vacuum tubes and perhaps March (or June) 1960 weigh only 1.5 tons.” The UNIVAC LARC (Livermore This astute prophecy failed Advanced Research Computer) to factor in the massive was designed according to the effect the transistor [Dec requirements of Edward Teller 16] would have on (“the father of the hydrogen computer design, which bomb”), and was arguably the was hardly surprising since first supercomputer . Its main the technology was only a role was to run simulations for little over a year old. testing nuclear weapon designs. Transistorized computers It was built at Sperry Univac in of the early 1950’s include Philadelphia with Herman Bell Lab’s TRADIC [March Lukoff [May 2] as project 14], the Harwell CADET director. Its architecture was [Feb 00], and MIT’s TX-0 [Nov designed by Arthur Gehring and 20]. Probably the first was the A Bendix G-15. Photo by Gah4. Albert Tonik with circuitry by Manchester TC [Nov 16]. CC BY-SA 4.0. Josh Gray, assisted by Lukoff, Bill Winter, and Lloyd Stone. On the commercial side, IBM Over 400 G-15s were demoed its 608 on [Oct 7] 1954, manufactured, making it one of The LARC consisted of four but billed it as the first all- the most popular computers of cabinets, each one transistor calculator. When it the early 1960's. For instance, a approximately twenty feet long, went on sale in Dec. 1957, it G-15 was the first machine used four feet wide, and seven feet used 3,000 transistors and by Ken Thompson [Feb 4]. tall. There were twelve magnetic weighed 1.2 tons (which is close However, the G-15’s success drums, each approximately four to Popular Mechanics' weight wasn’t enough to establish feet wide, three feet deep and estimate). Bendix as a major player, and five feet tall. Other hardware included eight tape units, a card Control Data Corporation [July 8] later took over its computer reader, and a large printer. All business. this may explain why a new Bendix G-15 building was constructed at the One interesting add-on was the Lawrence Radiation Lab to Released GAMBIT electronic roulette house the machine. game. Players put “chips” on a March 1956 large board, and the computer The LARC arrived in a convoy of five 18-wheel trailers, with a The Bendix G-15 was figured the odds, printing the crew of approximately forty. It remarkably tiny, perhaps the winning numbers, while flashing took two months to complete smallest commercially available various lights and ringing a bell. the installation and another two electronic digital computer of its GAMBIT stood for “Game for months to get the computer time, although it was still Automation-Minded Bigwigs working. “refrigerator sized.” The basic Insensitive to Treachery”, and system consisted of a 5 by 3 by 3 was developed for the G-15’s The LARC CPU was able to foot cabinet, weighing around appearance at the New York perform an addition in about 4 966 pounds. Automation Exposition in Dec. ms, making it the fastest in the 1956. world until 1962 when the IBM Its 'diminutive' proportions 7030 STRETCH [April 26] were a consequence of the The G-15 is sometimes called the arrived. simplicity of its internals (450 first “personal” computer, but vacuum tubes plus 3,000 this (of course) is disputed. germanium diodes) and its use Other candidates include the of a magnetic drum rather than LINC [May 24], the PDP-8 DECUS mercury delay lines for memory. [March 22], and the IBM 610 The chief designer was Harry [Sept 3]. However, Huskey had March 1961 Huskey [Jan 19]. one installed in his home in 1955, making it the first "home The Digital Equipment The G-15 was also remarkably computer". He also received one Computer Users’ Society inexpensive: the base system of the last production G-15s, (DECUS) was founded by 2 Edward Fredkin [Oct 2] “Curriculum 68: It could comfortably rest upon a primarily as a software library. Recommendations for academic small desk with additional It went on to play a critical role programs in computer science” controls in a separate breadbox- in the distribution of games by William F. Atchison, Samuel sized console. It was a 16-bit across the US during the 1970's, D. Conte, and many others. It minicomputer, with 8-16 KB of including: “Colossal Cave succeeded “An Undergraduate magnetic core memory. Adventure” by Will Crowther Program in Computer Science”, [March 11], “Star Trek” by Don which had appeared in the When Chuck Thacker [Feb 26] was developing the Alto, he Daglow [Sept 12], and “Hunt the CACM in Sept. 1965. plumped for a bitmapped/raster Wumpus” by Gregory Yob [April Curriculum ’68's main screen partly due to the ugly text 00]. It also helped to popularize suggestion was to encourage rendering on the PDS-1’s at commercial titles such as Zork university computer science PARC.
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