The Innovators: How a Group of Inventors, Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolutio - Isaacson Walter - Страница 1

1

HOW A GROUP OF HACKERS, GENIUSES, AND GEEKS CREATED THE DIGITAL REVOLUTION

Thank you for downloading this Simon & Schuster eBook.

Join our mailing list and get updates on new releases, deals, bonus content and other great books from Simon & Schuster.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP

or visit us online to sign up at

eBookNews.SimonandSchuster.com

CONTENTS

Illustrated Timeline

Introduction

CHAPTER 1

Ada, Countess of Lovelace

CHAPTER 2

The Computer

CHAPTER 3

Programming

CHAPTER 4

The Transistor

CHAPTER 5

The Microchip

CHAPTER 6

Video Games

CHAPTER 7

The Internet

CHAPTER 8

The Personal Computer

CHAPTER 9

Software

CHAPTER 10

Online

CHAPTER 11

The Web

CHAPTER 12

Ada Forever

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Notes

Photo Credits

Index

1843

Ada, Countess of Lovelace, publishes “Notes” on Babbage’s Analytical Engine.

1847

George Boole creates a system using algebra for logical reasoning.

1890

The census is tabulated with Herman Hollerith’s punch-card machines.

1931

Vannevar Bush devises the Differential Analyzer, an analog electromechanical computer.

1935

Tommy Flowers pioneers use of vacuum tubes as on-off switches in circuits.

1937

Alan Turing publishes “On Computable Numbers,” describing a universal computer.

Claude Shannon describes how circuits of switches can perform tasks of Boolean algebra.

Bell Labs’ George Stibitz proposes a calculator using an electric circuit.

Howard Aiken proposes construction of large digital computer and discovers parts of Babbage’s Difference Engine at Harvard.

John Vincent Atanasoff puts together concepts for an electronic computer during a long December night’s drive.

1938

William Hewlett and David Packard form company in Palo Alto garage.

1939

Atanasoff finishes model of electronic computer with mechanical storage drums.

Turing arrives at Bletchley Park to work on breaking German codes.

1941

Konrad Zuse completes Z3, a fully functional electromechanical programmable digital computer.

John Mauchly visits Atanasoff in Iowa, sees computer demonstrated.

1942

Atanasoff completes partly working computer with three hundred vacuum tubes, leaves for Navy.

1943

Colossus, a vacuum-tube computer to break German codes, is completed at Bletchley Park.

1944

Harvard Mark I goes into operation.

John von Neumann goes to Penn to work on ENIAC.

1945

Von Neumann writes “First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC” describing a stored-program computer.

Six women programmers of ENIAC are sent to Aberdeen for training.

Vannevar Bush publishes “As We May Think,” describing personal computer.

Bush publishes “Science, the Endless Frontier,” proposing government funding of academic and industrial research.

ENIAC is fully operational.

1947

Transistor invented at Bell Labs.

1950

Turing publishes article describing a test for artificial intelligence.

1952

Grace Hopper develops first computer compiler.

Von Neumann completes modern computer at the Institute for Advanced Study.

UNIVAC predicts Eisenhower election victory.

1954

Turing commits suicide.

Texas Instruments introduces silicon transistor and helps launch Regency radio.

1956

Shockley Semiconductor founded.

First artificial intelligence conference.

1957

Robert Noyce, Gordon Moore, and others form Fairchild Semiconductor.

Russia launches Sputnik.

1958

Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) announced.

Jack Kilby demonstrates integrated circuit, or microchip.

1959

Noyce and Fairchild colleagues independently invent microchip.

1960

J. C. R. Licklider publishes “Man-Computer Symbiosis.”

Paul Baran at RAND devises packet switching.

1961

President Kennedy proposes sending man to the moon.

1962

MIT hackers create Spacewar game.

Licklider becomes founding director of ARPA’s Information Processing Techniques Office.

Doug Engelbart publishes “Augmenting Human Intellect.”

1963

Licklider proposes an “Intergalactic Computer Network.”

Engelbart and Bill English invent the mouse.

1964

Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters take bus trip across America.

1965

Ted Nelson publishes first article about “hypertext.”

Moore’s Law predicts microchips will double in power each year or so.