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The Abacus
The abacus (plural abaci or abacuses), also called a counting frame, is a calculating tool that was in use in Europe, China and Russia more than 1000 years ago. The “high tech” beads on the wires of the abacus replaced the stones in the column of the counting board. Its origin is lost somewhere in Chinese, Arabic, Europe, and Egyptian history.
http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Abacus -
Pascal
The Pascaline was a gear driven machine that performed only addition and subtraction. Pascal’s invention was digital, meaning that like the abacus, it dealt with whole numbers and produced precise results. It could only do addition and subtraction, with numbers being entered by manipulating its dials.
https://www.britannica.com/technology/Pascaline -
Jacquard
A hundred or so years later another Frenchman, Joseph Jacquard (1752- 1834) built a weaving machine that used punch cards to select the threads to be incorporated into the pattern. It simplifies the process of manufacturing textiles with such complex patterns as brocade, damask and matelasse. It was automatically read from punched wooden cards, held together in a long row by rope.
http://www.ideafinder.com/history/inventions/jacquard.htm -
Babbage
Charles Babbage (1792- 1872) designed his analytical engine, the analytical engine used a mechanical memory to store immediate calculated results so they wouldn’t have to be copied by hand on to paper and then re-entered, which is what caused most of the errors. Babbage’s design also allowed entering both numbers and calculation steps on punch cards. The analytical engine was to be steam powered.
http://www.fourmilab.ch/babbage/ -
Ada Byron
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Burroughs
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Hollerith
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The Harvard Mark 1
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Grace Hopper
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The ENIAC
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The IAS computer and the Binary System
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Processor
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Storage
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Hardware
