-
Charles Babbage conceives of a steam-driven calculating machine that would be able to compute tables of numbers.
-
Herman Hollerith designs a new punch card to calculate the 1880 census.
-
The FORTRAN programming language is born
-
Jack Kilby and Robert Noyce unveil the integrated circuit, known as the computer chip.
-
Radio Shack's initial production run of the TRS-80 was just 3,000. It sold like crazy.
-
Word processing becomes a reality as MicroPro International releases WordStar.
-
Word processing becomes a reality as MicroPro International releases WordStar.
-
Apple’s Lisa is the first personal computer with a GUI. It also features a drop-down menu and icons. It flops but eventually evolves into the Macintosh.
-
Microsoft announces Windows, its response to Apple’s GUI. Commodore unveils the Amiga 1000, which features advanced audio and video capabilities.
-
Compaq brings the Deskpro 386 to market. It’s 32-bit architecture provides as speed comparable to mainframes.
-
The term Wi-Fi becomes part of the computing language and users begin connecting to the Internet without wires.
-
Sony releases the PlayStation 2
-
Mozilla’s Firefox 1.0 challenges Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, the dominant web browers.
-
The iPhone brings many computer functions to the smartphone.
-
Alan Shugart leads a team of IBM engineers who invent the “floppy disk,” allowing data to be shared among computers.