John Vincent Atanasoff: Inventor of the Digital Computer October 3, 2006 History of Computer Science (2R930) Department of Mathematics & Computer Science Technische Universiteit Eindhoven Bas Kloet 0461462
[email protected] Paul van Tilburg 0459098
[email protected] Abstract This essay is about John Vincent Atanasoff’s greatest invention, the Atana- soff Berry Computer or ABC. We look into the design and construction of this computer, and also determine the effect the ABC has had on the world. While discussing this machine we cannot avoid the dispute and trial surrounding the ENIAC patents. We will try to put the ENIAC in the right context with respect to the ABC. Copyright c 2006 Bas Kloet and Paul van Tilburg The contents of this and the following documents and the LATEX source code that is used to generate them is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 license. Photos and images are excluded from this copyright. They were taken from [Mac88], [BB88] and [Mol88] and thus fall under their copyright accordingly. You are free: • to copy, distribute, display, and perform the work • to make derivative works • to make commercial use of the work Under the following conditions: Attribution: You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor. Share Alike: If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you may distribute the resulting work only under a license identical to this one. • For any reuse or distribution, you must make clear to others the license terms of this work. • Any of these conditions can be waived if you get permission from the copyright holder.