Section II: General-Purpose Electronic Computers Flashcards
(190 cards)
1
Q
What are electromechanical computers?
A
computers that use electricity only to move its parts
2
Q
What was the problem with artillery guns in 1943?
A
they needed firing tables
3
Q
What was taken into account when calculating firing tables?
A
wind speed/direction, distance, humidity, elevation, and temperature
4
Q
What does a firing table do?
A
it tells the gun operator at which angle to shoot the gun
5
Q
What traditionally created firing tables?
A
human computers
6
Q
What machine did the Aberdeen Proving Ground have that helped it calculate firing tables?
A
a Differential Analyzer
7
Q
What other university had the U.S. Army enlisted help from because they also had a Differential Analyzer?
A
UPenn
8
Q
Who was assigned to supervise the computer team at UPenn?
A
Dr. Herman Goldstine
9
Q
When was Goldstine drafted into the Army?
A
1942
10
Q
Where and what did Goldstine teach before being drafted?
A
math at the University of Michigan
11
Q
Who did Goldstine send to recruit smart people to join the human-computer team at UPenn?
A
his wife, Adele
12
Q
Who sent a proposal to UPenn to receive funding for a fully electronic computer in 1942?
A
John Mauchly
13
Q
A
14
Q
Why did Goldstine’s team at UPenn not want to use the Differential Analyzer?
A
it broke down too much
15
Q
Who presented a proposal for an electronic computer at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds?
A
Goldstine, Mauchly, and Eckert
16
Q
How many people were initially assigned to the ENIAC project?
A
12
17
Q
Who was the lead engineer for the ENIAC?
A
Eckert
18
Q
How many vacuum tubes did the ENIAC need?
A
18,000
19
Q
Why were vacuum tubes problematic?
A
they broke down all the time
20
Q
What did Eckert do to prevent the vacuum tubes on the ENIAC from malfunctioning?
A
he used the highest quality ones and ran them at only 10% of their voltage
21
Q
What were the 2 main advantages of the ENIAC over mechanical and electromechanical machines?
A
it was faster and could perform conditional branching
22
Q
What is programming?
A
when a computer is instructed to do a lot of tasks
23
Q
How would someone program the ENIAC?
A
they would unplug cables and move them to another plug
24
Q
How many women were selected as the original programmers of the ENIAC?
A
6
25
Who did Eckert and Mauchly enlist for help with the EDVAC?
John von Neumann
26
Who is John von Neumann?
a famous mathematician who helped design the atomic bomb
27
In 1945, Neuman summarized their plans for the EDVAC in which document?
First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC
28
How did the EDVAC do math?
in binary
29
What did the EDVAC use internally?
decimal
30
How does the EDVAC's memory compare to the ENIAC's?
it was larger
31
What is the store program concept? (the EDVAC used this)
the concept where data and instructions would be stored in the same memory
32
What would instructions for the EDVAC be represented as?
systems of binary codes
33
When was the ENIAC complete?
fall of 1945
34
How much did the ENIAC weigh when completed?
30 tons
35
What shape was the ENIAC in?
a U-shape
36
When was the ENIAC unveiled?
February 1946
37
Who sponsored the Moore School Lectures?
UPenn
38
What was the Moore School Lectures?
a school that taught students the principles of electronic computing
39
After working with the ENIAC team, where did Neumann return to work on his new computer?
Princeton, New Jersey
40
What was Neumann's new computer called?
the IAS Computer
41
When was the IAS Computer completed?
1951
42
What was special about the IAS Computer?
it used the stored program concept
43
Who invented the Williams tube?
Frederic Williams
44
Who made the Manchester Baby?
Max Newman and Frederic Williams
45
Where was the Manchester Baby built?
England
46
Why was the machine called the Manchester Baby?
because of its limited functionality
47
What was the Manchester Baby meant to do?
test the Williams tube and the stored program concept
48
When was the Manchester Baby completed?
1948
49
Who made the EDSAC?
Maurice Wilkes
50
What title did the EDSAC receive?
it was the first practical stored program computer
51
Why wasn't the EDVAC the first store program computer?
because it was not completed until later
52
Why did Eckert and Mauchly leave UPenn?
There were disputes over patent rights
53
When was the ENIAC patent finalized?
1964
54
What did the EDSAC use for memory?
a delay line
55
What element was used in delay lines?
mercury
56
When did the EDVAC run its first successful program?
1951
57
Which company offered Mauchly and Eckert jobs after they quit UPenn?
IBM
58
What was the name of the company Eckert and Mauchly made?
EMCC
59
What was EMCC's first product going to be?
the UNIVAC
60
What type of contract did they use to sell the UNIVAC?
fixed price contracts
61
What contracts should Eckert and Mauchly have used instead for the UNIVAC?
cost plus development contracts
62
How much did EMCC sell the UNIVAC for?
270k
63
How much did the UNIVAC cost to develop?
900k
64
When EMCC ran out of money to build the UNIVAC, which other computer did they sell?
the BINAC
65
How much money did they sell the BINAC for?
100k
66
How much money did the BINAC cost to make?
280k
67
When was the BINAC completed?
1949
68
Where was BINAC first sent?
to Northrop
69
In 1950, which company bought EMCC?
Remington Rand
70
How many vacuum tubes did the EDVAC use?
5k
71
Which election did UNIVAC predict correctly?
the 1952 election
72
Which candidate did UNIVAC correctly predict would win?
Dwight D. Eisenhower
73
Which 3 electronic computers had IBM been secretly developing?
the IBM 701, 702, and 650 models
74
Name the oldest to newest of the 3 first IBM electronic computers.
the IBM 701, 702, and 650
75
Which year was the IBM 701 announced?
1952
76
Why was the IBM 701 similar to the Neumann IAS Computer?
because they hired John von Neumann to help them
77
The IBM 701 was as powerful as which other computer?
the UNIVAC
78
What did IBM use for memory storage for the IBM 701?
Williams tubes
79
How was the IBM 702 different than the 701?
the 702 was marketed toward business data processing and the 701 was marketed toward scientific
80
Which year was the IBM 702 announced?
1953
81
Which year was the IBM 650 announced?
1953
82
What did the IBM 650 use for memory storage?
magnetic drums
83
Why did IBM sell the 650 model to universities for cheaper?
so they would offer a computer class, which would hopefully produce trained students
84
How many IBM 650 models were sold in total?
2,000+
85
Did IBM ever pass UNIVAC in installments?
yes, they did in 1955
86
Which company did Remington Rand acquire that UNIVAC often fought with?
ERA
87
In 1955, Remington Rand was acquired by which other company?
Sperry Gyroscope
88
Sperry Gyroscope and Remington Rand merged to create which company?
Sperry Rand
89
When was CDC founded?
1957
90
What did CDC produce?
high-performance computers for scientific purposes
91
What were the 8 main competitors in the computer industry by the late 50s?
Burroughs, NCR, IBM, Honeywell, Sperry Rand, General Electric, CDC, and RCA
92
By 1965, what percent of the market share did IBM have?
65%
93
The computer industry was often referred to as ____ and the seven dwarfs.
IBM
94
When RCA and General Electric exited the computer industry, what were the remaining competitors referred to as?
BUNCH
95
What is the CPU considered to be?
the brains of the computer
96
What does the CPU do?
it does the math and executes instructions
97
98
What CPU did the ENIAC use?
vacuum tubes
99
What does a vacuum tube look like?
a light bulb
100
What does a vacuum tube do?
it regulates and amplifies the flow of electricity in a circuit
101
How do vacuum tubes perform math?
the rapid electrical pulses simulated counting, thus performing math
102
Where was the transistor invented?
Bell Labs
103
104
Bell Labs is a subsidiary of which company?
AT&T
105
Why weren't transistors used in commercial computers when they were first invented?
they weren't reliable enough
106
What is the function of a transistor?
the same as a vacuum tube, amplifying and regulating the electrical current of a circuit
107
What is another word for integrated circuit?
microchip
108
Who invented the microchip?
Robert Noyce and Jack Kilby
109
110
What semiconductor is primarily used in a microchip?
silicon
111
What technology replaced vacuum tubes?
transistors
112
What technology replaced transistors?
microchips
113
What did the ENIAC use for memory?
vacuum tubes
114
What did the EDVAC use for memory?
delay lines
115
Which toxic liquid is used in delay lines?
mercury
116
What is a delay line?
a long metal column that contains mercury inside
117
What is a Williams tube similar to?
a cathode-ray tube
118
Which type of memory involved a metal drum that had heads to read and write data?
magnetic drum memory
119
What are core memories made of?
thousands of crisscrossing wires that form a lattice
120
Core memory is an example of what?
random access memory or RAM
121
Which IBM computers were the first to use core memory?
the 704 and 705 models
122
Delay lines are what type of memory?
sequential access
123
What is sequential access memory?
when the values are read in the order they appear
124
Since the 70s, what have microchips been used for?
memory and processors
125
What was the ENIAC's storage?
punched cards
126
What was the UNIVAC's storage?
a magnetic tape drive
127
Which other early computers used magnetic tape drives?
IBM 701 and 702
128
Why were the IBM magnetic tape drives lighter than the ones used in the UNIVAC?
their's were made out of plastic
129
What were the advantages of magnetic tape drives over punched cards?
they were faster, had a larger storage capacity, and could be reused
130
What is the disadvantage of magnetic tape drives?
they are only machine-readable and they are sequential access
131
Who first proposed disk storage in the 40s?
Eckert
132
Which company invented the disk unit?
IBM
133
What type of access do disks offer?
random access
134
When was the disk unit invented?
1956
135
Which company invented the floppy disk?
IBM
136
137
Who popularized the concept of high-level coding languages?
Grace Hopper
138
In 1944, Grace Hopper was assigned to which school to program which computer?
Harvard, the Mark 1
139
What could the Mark I not perform?
conditional branching
140
What were the names of the compilers used in the UNIVAC?
A-0 and B-0
141
What were the bad parts about the UNIVAC's compilers?
they were very slow and lacked efficiency
142
Who made the UNIVAC's compilers?
Grace Hopper
143
What was the first high-level programming language to receive widespread use?
FORTRAN
144
Who created FORTRAN?
John Backus
145
What did Backus realize about the cost of running computers?
75% of it was just paying the programmers
146
What is FORTRAN short for?
Formula Translator
147
FORTRAN had a syntax similar to what?
algebra
148
How long did Backus expect to create FORTRAN?
6 months
149
How long did it really take to create FORTRAN?
3 years
150
When was FORTRAN released?
1957
151
FORTRAN was released for which computer?
the IBM 704
152
When UNIVAC improved its B-1 compiler, they re-released it as what?
the FLOW-MATIC programming language
153
When was COBOL standardized by the government?
1960
154
What was Hopper's most noticeable impact on COBOL?
the English-like syntax
155
Why was Hopper thrown out of a UNIVAC executive's office?
because she wanted to replace English terms in her FLOW-MATIC language with their French equivalents
156
Most modern programming languages can be traced back to which programming language?
the C language
157
Which decade was the C language invented
the 70s
158
Where was the C language invented?
Bell Labs
159
Where was LISP invented?
MIT
160
When was LISP invented?
1958
161
What was unique about LISP's syntax?
it used lots of parentheses
162
What is LISP good for?
programming AI and application software
163
Were the IBM 702 and 705 business or scientific targeted?
business
164
Were the IBM 701 and 704 business or scientific targeted?
scientific
165
What is the main difference between scientific and business computers?
floating-point arithmetic
166
What does floating-point arithmetic do?
it allows computers to represent very large and very small numbers with lots of precision
167
Which computers were introduced by IBM in 1959?
the 7090 and 7094
168
What did the IBM 7090, 7094, and 1401 use for memory and processing?
core memory and transistors
169
What purpose were the IBM 7090 and 7094 intended for?
scientific
170
What purpose was the IBM 1401 intended for?
business
171
Why would customers in the 50s and early 60s not want to upgrade their computer?
because you had to rewrite the code for the new computer from scratch
172
When did IBM announce its System/360 line of computers?
1964
172
What was unique about the System/360?
it was backward and forward-compatible
172
What was the speed difference/ratio of the fastest and slowest System/360 model?
25 to 1
173
How did IBM achieve the System/360's compatibility?
microprogramming
174
What was the flagship operating system for the System/360?
OS/360
175
What is an operating system?
a program that connects all the parts of the computer together, allowing them to work with each other
176
Who was the manager of the OS/360 project?
Fred Brooks
177
What did Fred Brooks do with the OS/360 project that he hoped would make it go faster?
he added more people
178
What was Fred Brooks's mistake with the OS/360 project?
adding more people
179
What is Brooks's Law?
adding more manpower to a late software project makes it later
180
When did Brooks release the book The Mythical Man-Month?
1975
181
What was The Mythical Man-Month?
a collection of essays that explains the lessons he learned while working on the OS/360 project
182
When was the first NATO-sponsored software engineering conference?
1968
183
When was the first IBM personal computer released?
1981
184
Which company tried to claim patent rights over all electronic computers?
Sperry Rand
185
When did the legal battle with Sperry Rand and its competitors end?
1973
186
Judge Earl Larson declared what about computer patent rights?
computers were in the public domain, anyone could make them without having the pay royalty fees to Sperry Rand
187
In 1986, Burroughs and Sperry Rand merged to create which company?
Unysis
188
DEC's most famous product was which type of computer?
the minicomputer
