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Cyhist Apr 25 1997 A
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Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 08:38:07 EDT
Reply-To: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> Sender: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> From: keith reid-green <kreid-green@ETS.ORG>
Subject: CM> Reconstructing Colossus
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Community Memory: Discussion List on the History of Cyberspace ______________________________________________________________________
Mike O'Brien's interesting posting re Colossus made me think a bit about the "first electronic digital computer." Personally, I can't buy the idea that a special-purpose machine qualifies. I don't think an electronic digital computer must have a stored program, essential as this concept has become. But it must be able to solve problems that its designers didn't envision when they built it--that is, it must be programmable and it must be able to do a wide set of problems.
Does this put a lower bound on the speed of the machine? Not to me. If a computer can solve a problem, the issue of how long it takes is not material to whether it is a "Computer." Also, almost all computers are constrained by storage size, so to say that an IBM XT can't do weather forecasting for the entire planet, so it doesn't qualify as a computer, isn't fair either.
It would be a good thing if we could arrive at a definition of what the "first electronic digital computer" had to be capable of. Maybe then we could determine which machine was the first to qualify.
Keith Reid-Green
KReid-Green@ets.org
Princeton, NJ
______________________________________________________________________
Reply-To: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> Sender: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> From: keith reid-green <kreid-green@ETS.ORG>
Subject: CM> Reconstructing Colossus
______________________________________________________________________
Community Memory: Discussion List on the History of Cyberspace ______________________________________________________________________
Mike O'Brien's interesting posting re Colossus made me think a bit about the "first electronic digital computer." Personally, I can't buy the idea that a special-purpose machine qualifies. I don't think an electronic digital computer must have a stored program, essential as this concept has become. But it must be able to solve problems that its designers didn't envision when they built it--that is, it must be programmable and it must be able to do a wide set of problems.
Does this put a lower bound on the speed of the machine? Not to me. If a computer can solve a problem, the issue of how long it takes is not material to whether it is a "Computer." Also, almost all computers are constrained by storage size, so to say that an IBM XT can't do weather forecasting for the entire planet, so it doesn't qualify as a computer, isn't fair either.
It would be a good thing if we could arrive at a definition of what the "first electronic digital computer" had to be capable of. Maybe then we could determine which machine was the first to qualify.
Keith Reid-Green
KReid-Green@ets.org
Princeton, NJ
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