| 500 B.C. |
The abacus was first used by the Babylonians as an aid to simple
arithmetic at sometime around this date. The abacus in the form we are
most familiar with was first used in China in around 1300 A.D. |
| 1614 |
Scotsman John Napier (1550-1617) published a paper outlining his
discovery of the logarithm. Napier also invented an ingenious system of
moveable rods (referred to as Napier's Rods or Napier's bones). These
allowed the operator to multiply, divide and calculate square and
calculate cube roots by moving the rods around and placing them in
specially constructed boards. |
| 1623 |
Wilhelm Schickard (1592-1635), of Tuebingen, Wuerttemberg (now in
Germany), made a "Calculating Clock". This mechanical machine was capable
of adding and subtracting up to 6 digit numbers, and warned of an overflow
by ringing a bell. Operations were carried out by wheels, and a complete
revolution of the units wheel incremented the tens wheel in much the same
way counters on old cassette deck worked.
The machine and plans were lost and forgotten in the war that was going
on, then rediscovered in 1935, only to be lost in war again, and then
finally rediscovered in 1956 by the same man (Franz Hammer)! The machine
was reconstructed in 1960, and found to be workable. Schickard was a
friend of the astronomer Johannes Kepler since they met in the winter of
1617. |
| 1625 |
William Oughtred (1575-1660) invented the slide
rule. |
| 1642 |
French mathematician, Blaise Pascal built a mechanical adding machine
(the "Pascaline"). Despite being more limited than Schickard's
'Calculating Clock' (see 1623), Pascal's machine became far more well
known. He was able to sell around a dozen of his machines in various
forms, coping with up to 8 digits. |
| 1668 |
Sir Samuel Morland (1625-1695), of England, produces a non decimal
adding machine, suitable for use with English money. Instead of a carry
mechanism, it registers carries on auxiliary dials, from which the user
must re-enter them as addends. |
| 1671 |
German mathematician, Gottfried Leibniz designed a machine to carry
out multiplication, the 'Stepped Reckoner'. It can multiple number of up
to 5 and 12 digits to give a 16 digit operand. The machine was later lost
in an attic until 1879. Leibniz was also the co-inventor of calculus. |
| 1775 |
Charles, the third Earl Stanhope, of England, makes a successful
multiplying calculator similar to Leibniz's. |
| 1776 |
Mathieus Hahn, somewhere in what will be Germany, also makes a
successful multiplying calculator that he started in 1770. |
| 1786 |
J. H. Mueller, of the Hessian army, conceives the idea of what came to
be called a "difference engine". That's a special purpose calculator for
tabulating values of a polynomial, given the differences between certain
values so that the polynomial is uniquely specified; it's useful for any
function that can be approximated by a polynomial over suitable intervals.
Mueller's attempt to raise funds fails and the project is forgotten. |
| 1801 |
Joseph-Maire Jacuard developed an automatic loom controlled by punched
cards. |
| 1820 |
Charles Xavier Thomas de Colmar (1785-1870), of France, makes his
"Arithmometer", the first mass-produced calculator. It does multiplication
using the same general approach as Leibniz's calculator; with assistance
from the user it can also do division. It is also the most reliable
calculator yet. Machines of this general design, large enough to occupy
most of a desktop, continue to be sold for about 90 years. |
| 1822 |
Charles Babbage (1792-1871) designed his first mechanical computer,
the first prototype for the difference engine. Babbage invented 2 machines
the Analytical Engine (a general purpose mathematical device, see 1834)
and the Difference Engine (a re-invention of Mueller's 1786 machine for
solving polynomials), both machines were too complicated to be built
(although attempt was made in 1832) - but the theories worked. The
analytical engine (outlined in 1833) involved many processes similar to
the early electronic computers - notably the use of punched cards for
input. |
| 1832 |
Babbage and Joseph Clement produce a prototype segment of his
difference engine, which operates on 6-digit numbers and 2nd-order
differences (i.e. can tabulate quadratic polynomials). The complete
engine, which would be room-sized, is planned to be able to operate both
on 6th-order differences with numbers of about 20 digits, and on 3rd-order
differences with numbers of 30 digits. Each addition would be done in two
phases, the second one taking care of any carries generated in the first.
The output digits would be punched into a soft metal plate, from which a
plate for a printing press could be made. But there are various
difficulties, and no more than this prototype piece is ever assembled. |
| 1834 |
George Scheutz, of Stockholm, produces a small difference engine in
wood, after reading a brief description of Babbage's project. |
| 1834 |
Babbage conceives, and begins to design, his "Analytical Engine". The
program was stored on read-only memory, specifically in the form of punch
cards. Babbage continues to work on the design for years, though after
about 1840 the changes are minor. The machine would operate on 40-digit
numbers; the "mill" (CPU) would have 2 main accumulators and some
auxiliary ones for specific purposes, while the "store" (memory) would
hold perhaps 100 more numbers. There would be several punch card readers,
for both programs and data; the cards would be chained and the motion of
each chain could be reversed. The machine would be able to perform
conditional jumps. There would also be a form of microcoding: the meaning
of instructions would depend on the positioning of metal studs in a
slotted barrel, called the "control barrel". The machine would do an
addition in 3 seconds and a multiplication or division in 2-4 minutes. |
| 1842 |
Babbage's difference engine project is officially cancelled. (The cost
overruns have been considerable, and Babbage is spending too much time on
redesigning the Analytical Engine.) |
| 1843 |
Scheutz and his son Edvard Scheutz produce a 3rd-order difference
engine with printer, and the Swedish government agrees to fund their next
development. |
| 1847 |
Babbage designs an improved, simpler difference engine, a project which
took 2 years. The machine could operate on 7th-order differences and
31-digit numbers, but nobody is interested in paying to have it built.
(In 1989-91, however, a team at London's Science Museum will do just
that. They will use components of modern construction, but with tolerances
no better than Clement could have provided... and, after a bit of
tinkering and detail-debugging, they will find that the machine does
indeed work.) |
| 1848 |
British Mathematician George Boole devised binary algebra (Boolean
algebra) paving the way for the development of a binary computer almost a
century later. See 1939. |
| 1853 |
To Babbage's delight, the Scheutzes complete the first full-scale
difference engine, which they call a Tabulating Machine. It operates on
15-digit numbers and 4th-order differences, and produces printed output as
Babbage's would have. A second machine is later built to the same design
by the firm of Brian Donkin of London. |
| 1858 |
The first Tabulating Machine (see 1853) is bought by the Dudley
Observatory in Albany, New York, and the second one by the British
government. The Albany machine is used to produce a set of astronomical
tables; but the observatory's director is then fired for this extravagant
purchase, and the machine is never seriously used again, eventually ending
up in a museum. The second machine, however, has a long and useful life. |
| 1871 |
Babbage produces a prototype section of the Analytical Engine's mill
and printer. |
| 1878 |
Ramon Verea, living in New York City, invents a calculator with an
internal multiplication table; this is much faster than the shifting
carriage or other digital methods. He isn't interested in putting it into
production; he just wants to show that a Spaniard can invent as well as an
American. |
| 1879 |
A committee investigates the feasibility of completing the Analytical
Engine and concludes that it is impossible now that Babbage is dead. The
project is then largely forgotten, though Howard Aiken is a notable
exception. |
| 1885 |
A multiplying calculator more compact than the Arithmometer enters
mass production. The design is the independent, and more or less
simultaneous, invention of Frank S. Baldwin, of the United States, and T.
Odhner, a Swede living in Russia. The fluted drums are replaced by a
"variable-toothed gear" design: a disk with radial pegs that can be made
to protrude or retract from it. |
| 1886 |
Dorr E. Felt (1862-1930), of Chicago, makes his "Comptometer". This is
the first calculator where the operands are entered merely by pressing
keys rather than having to be, for example, dialled in. It is feasible
because of Felt's invention of a carry mechanism fast enough to act while
the keys return from being pressed. |
| 1889 |
Felt invents the first printing desk calculator. |
| 1890 |
1890 U.S. census. The 1880 census took 7 years to complete since all
processing was done by hand off of journal sheets. The increasing
population suggested that by the 1890 census the data processing would
take longer than the 10 years before the next census - so a competition
was held to try to find a better method. This was won by a Census
Department employee, Herman Hollerith - who went on to found the
Tabulating Machine Company (see 1911), later to become IBM. Herman
borrowed Babbage's idea of using the punched cards (see 1801) from the
textile industry for the data storage. This method was used in the 1890
census, the result (62,622,250 people) was released in just 6 weeks! This
storage allowed much more in-depth analysis of the data and so, despite
being more efficient, the 1890 census cost about double (actually 198%)
that of the 1880 census. |
| 1892 |
William S. Burroughs (1857-1898), of St. Louis, invents a machine
similar to Felt's (see 1886) but more robust, and this is the one that
really starts the mechanical office calculator industry. |
| 1896 |
IBM founded (as the Tabulating Machine Company), see 1924. Founded by
Herman Hollerith (1860-1929, see also 1890). |
| 1899 |
"Everything that can be invented has already been invented.", Charles
H. Duell, director of the U.S. Patent Office |
| 1906 |
Henry Babbage, Charles's son, with the help of the firm of R. W.
Munro, completes the mill of his father's Analytical Engine, just to show
that it would have worked. It does. The complete machine is never
produced. |
| 1906 |
Electronic Tube (or Electronic Valve) developed by Lee De Forest in
America. Before this it would have been impossible to make digital
electronic computers. |
| 1911 |
Merger of companies, including Herman Hollerith's Tabulating Machine
Company, to Computing - Tabulating - Recording Company - which became IBM
in 1924. |
| 1919 |
W. H. Eccles and F. W. Jordan publish the first flip-flop circuit
design. |
| 1924 - February |
International Business Machines (IBM corporation) formed after more
mergers involving the Computing - Tabulating - Recording Company - see
1911. By 1990 IBM had an income of around $69 Billion (and 373,816
employees), although in 1992 recession caused a cut in stock dividends
(for the first time in the company's history) and the sacking of 40,000
employees. |
| 1931-1932 |
E. Wynn-Williams, at Cambridge, England, uses thyratron tubes to
construct a binary digital counter for use in connection with physics
experiments. |
| 1935 |
International Business Machines introduces the "IBM 601", a punch card
machine with an arithmetic unit based on relays and capable of doing a
multiplication in 1 second. The machine becomes important both in
scientific and commercial computation, and about 1500 of them are
eventually made. |
| 1937 |
Alan M. Turing (1912-1954), of Cambridge University, England,
publishes a paper on "computable numbers" - the mathematical theory of
computation. This paper solves a mathematical problem, but the solution is
achieved by reasoning (as a mathematical device) about the theoretical
simplified computer known today as a Turing machine. |
| 1937 |
George Stibitz (c.1910-) of the Bell Telephone Laboratories (Bell
Labs), New York City, constructs a demonstration 1-bit binary adder using
relays. This is one of the first binary computers, although at this stage
it was only a demonstration machine improvements continued leading to the
'complex number calculator' of Jan. 1940. |
| 1938 |
Claude E. Shannon (1916-) publishes a paper on the implementation of
symbolic logic using relays. |
| 1938 |
Konrad Zuse (1910-1995) of Berlin, with some assistance from Helmut
Schreyer, completes a prototype mechanical binary programmable calculator,
the first binary calculator it is based on Boolean Algebra (see 1848).
Originally called the "V1" but retroactively renamed "Z1" after the war.
It works with floating point numbers having a 7-bit exponent, 16-bit
mantissa, and a sign bit. The memory uses sliding metal parts to store 16
such numbers, and works well; but the arithmetic unit is less successful.
The program is read from punched tape -- not paper tape, but discarded 35
mm movie film. Data values can be entered from a numeric keyboard, and
outputs are displayed on electric lamps. |
| 1939 - January 1 |
Hewlett-Packard formed by David Hewlett and William Packard in a
garage in California. A coin toss decided the name. |
| 1939 - November |
John V. Atanasoff (1903-) and graduate student Clifford Berry
(?-1963), of Iowa State College (now the Iowa State University), Ames,
Iowa, complete a prototype 16-bit adder. This is the first machine to
calculate using vacuum tubes. |
| 1939 |
Start of WWII. This spurred many improvements in technology - and led
to the development of machines such as the Colossus (see 1943). |
| 1939 |
Zuse and Schreyer begin work on the "V2" (later "Z2"), which will
marry the Z1's existing mechanical memory unit to a new arithmetic unit
using relay logic. The project is interrupted for a year when Zuse is
drafted, but then released. (Zuse is a friend of Wernher von Braun, who
will later develop the *other* "V2", and after that, play a key role in
the US space program.) |
| 1939/1940 |
Schreyer completes a prototype 10-bit adder using vacuum tubes, and a
prototype memory using neon lamps. |
| 1940 - January |
At Bell Labs, Samuel Williams and Stibitz complete a calculator which
can operate on complex numbers, and give it the imaginative name of the
"Complex Number Calculator"; it is later known as the "Model I Relay
Calculator". It uses telephone switching parts for logic: 450 relays and
10 crossbar switches. Numbers are represented in "plus 3 BCD"; that is,
for each decimal digit, 0 is represented by binary 0011, 1 by 0100, and so
on up to 1100 for 9; this scheme requires fewer relays than straight BCD.
Rather than requiring users to come to the machine to use it, the
calculator is provided with three remote keyboards, at various places in
the building, in the form of teletypes. Only one can be used at a time,
and the output is automatically displayed on the same one. In September
1940, a teletype is set up at a mathematical conference in Hanover, New
Hampshire, with a connection to New York, and those attending the
conference can use the machine remotely. |
| 1941 - Summer |
Atanasoff and Berry complete a special-purpose calculator for solving
systems of simultaneous linear equations, later called the "ABC"
("Atanasoff-Berry Computer"). This has 60 50-bit words of memory in the
form of capacitors (with refresh circuits -- the first regenerative
memory) mounted on two revolving drums. The clock speed is 60 Hz, and an
addition takes 1 second. For secondary memory it uses punch cards, moved
around by the user. The holes are not actually punched in the cards, but
burned. The punch card system's error rate is never reduced beyond 0.001%,
and this isn't really good enough. (Atanasoff will leave Iowa State after
the US enters the war, and this will end his work on digital computing
machines.) |
| 1941 - December |
Now working with limited backing from the DVL (German Aero- nautical
Research Institute), Zuse completes the "V3" (later "Z3"): the first
operational programmable calculator. It works with floating point numbers
having a 7-bit exponent, 14-bit mantissa (with a "1" bit automatically
prefixed unless the number is 0), and a sign bit. The memory holds 64 of
these words and therefore requires over 1400 relays; there are 1200 more
in the arithmetic and control units. The program, input, and output are
implemented as described above for the Z1. Conditional jumps are not
available. The machine can do 3-4 additions per second, and takes 3-5
seconds for a multiplication. It is a marginal decision whether to call
the Z3 a prototype; with its small memory it is certainly not very useful
on the equation- solving problems that the DVL was mostly interested in. |
| 1943 |
Computers between 1943 and 1959 (or thereabouts - some say this era
did not start until UNIVAC-1 in 1951) usually regarded as 'first
generation' and are based on valves and wire circuits. The are
characterised by the use of punched cards and vacuum valves. All
programming was done in machine code. A typical machine of the era was
UNIVAC, see 1951. |
| 1943 |
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.", Thomas
Watson, chairman of IBM. |
| 1943 - January |
The Harvard Mark I (originally ASCC Mark I, Harvard-IBM Automatic
Sequence Controlled Calculator) was built at Harvard University by Howard
H. Aiken (1900-1973) and his team, partly financed by IBM - it became the
first program controlled calculator. The whole machine is 51 feet long,
weighs 5 tons, and incorporates 750,000 parts. It used 3304
electromechanical relays as on-off switches, had 72 accumulators (each
with it's own arithmetic unit) as well as mechanical register with a
capacity of 23 digits plus sign. The arithmetic is fixed-point, with a
plugboard setting determining the number of decimal places. I/O facilities
include card readers, a card punch, paper tape readers, and typewriters.
There are 60 sets of rotary switches, each of which can be used as a
constant register - sort of mechanical read-only memory. The program is
read from one paper tape; data can be read from the other tapes, or the
card readers, or from the constant registers. Conditional jumps are not
available. However, in later years the machine is modified to support
multiple paper tape readers for the program, with the transfer from one to
another being conditional, sort of like a conditional subroutine call.
Another addition allows the provision of plugboard-wired subroutines
callable from the tape.
Used to create ballistics tables for the US Navy. |
| 1943 - April |
Max Newman, Wynn-Williams, and their team (including Alan Turing) at
the secret Government Code and Cypher School ('Station X'), Bletchley
Park, Bletchley, England, complete the "Heath Robinson". This is a
specialized machine for cipher-breaking, not a general-purpose calculator
or computer but some sort of logic device, using a combination of
electronics and relay logic. It reads data optically at 2000 characters
per second from 2 closed loops of paper tape, each typically about 1000
characters long. It was significant since it was the fore-runner of
Colossus, see December 1943.
Newman knew Turing from Cambridge (Turing was a student of Newman's.),
and had been the first person to see a draft of Turing's 1937 paper.
Heath Robinson is the name of a British cartoonist known for drawings
of comical machines, like the American Rube Goldberg. Two later machines
in the series will be named after London stores with "Robinson" in their
names. |
| 1943 - September |
Williams and Stibitz complete the "Relay Interpolator", later called
the "Model II Relay Calculator". This is a programmable calculator; again,
the program and data are read from paper tapes. An innovative feature is
that, for greater reliability, numbers are represented in a biquinary
format using 7 relays for each digit, of which exactly 2 should be "on":
01 00001 for 0, 01 00010 for 1, and so on up to 10 10000 for 9. Some of
the later machines in this series will use the biquinary notation for the
digits of floating-point numbers.) |
| 1943 - December |
The earliest Programmable Electronic Computer first ran (in Britain),
it contained 2400 Vacuum tubes for logic, and was called the Colossus. It
was built, by Dr Thomas Flowers at The Post Office Research Laboratories
in London, to crack the German Lorenz (SZ42) Cipher used by the 'Enigma'
machines. Colossus was used at Bletchly Park during WWII - as a successor
to April's 'Robinson's. It translated an amazing 5000 characters a second,
and used punched tape for input. Although 10 were eventually built,
unfortunately they were destroyed immediately after they had finished
their work - it was so advanced that there was to be no possibility of
it's design falling into the wrong hands (presumably the Russians). One of
the early engineers wrote an emulation on an early Pentium - that ran at
1/2 the rate! |
| 1946 |
ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer): One of the first
totally electronic, valve driven, digital, computers. Development started
in 1943 and finished in 1946, at the Ballistic Research Laboratory, USA,
by John W. Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert. It weighed 30 tonnes and
contained 18,000 Electronic Valves, consuming around 25kW of electrical
power - widely recognised as the first Universal Electronic Computer. It
could do around 100,000 calculations a second. It was used for calculating
Ballistic trajectories and testing theories behind the Hydrogen bomb. |
| 1947 - end |
Invention of Transistor at The Bell Laboratories, USA, by William B.
Shockley, John Bardeen and Walter H. Brattain. |
| 1948 - June 21 |
SSEM, Small Scale Experimental Machine or 'Baby' was built at
Manchester University (UK), It ran it's first program on this date. Based
on ideas from Jon von Neumann (a Hungarian Mathematician) about stored
program computers, it was the first computer to store both it's programs
and data in RAM, as modern computers so.
By 1949 the 'Baby' had grown, and aquired a magentic drum for more
perminant storage, and it became the Manchester Mark I. The Ferranti MArk
I was basically the same as the Manchester Mark I but faster and made for
commmercial sale. |
| 1949 - May 6 |
Wilkes and a team at Cambridge University build a stored program
computer - EDSAC. It used paper tape I/O, and was the first stored-program
computer to operate a regular computing service. |
| 1949 |
EDVAC (electronic discrete variable computer) - First computer to use
Magnetic Tape. This was a breakthrough as previous computers had to be
re-programmed by re-wiring them whereas EDVAC could have new programs
loaded off of the tape. Proposed by John von Neumann, it was completed in
1952 at the Institute for Advance Study, Princeton, USA. |
| 1949 |
"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons.", Popular
Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science. |
| 1950 |
Floppy Disk invented at the Imperial University in Tokyo by Doctor
Yoshiro Nakamats, the sales license for the disk was granted to IBM. |
| 1950 |
The British mathematician and computer pioneer Alan Turing declared
that one day there would be a machine that could duplicate human
intelligence in every way and prove it by passing a specialized test. In
this test, a computer and a human hidden from view would be asked random
identical questions. If the computer were successful, the questioner would
be unable to distinguish the machine from the person by the answers. |
| 1951 |
High level language compiler invented by Grace Murray Hopper. |
| 1951 |
Whirlwind, the first real-time computer was built for the US Air
Defence System. |
| 1951 |
UNIVAC-1. The first commercially sucessful electronic computer, UNIVAC
I, was also the first general purpose computer - designed to handle both
numeric and textual information. Designed by J. Presper Eckert and John
Mauchly, whose corporation subsequently passed to Remington Rand. The
implementation of this machine marked the real beginning of the computer
era. Remington Rand delivered the first UNIVAC machine to the U.S. Bureau
of Census in 1951. This machine used magentic tape for input. |
| 1952 |
EDVAC (Electronic Discrete Variable Computer) completed at the
Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, USA (by Von Neumann and others). |
| 1953 |
Estimate that there are 100 computers in the world. |
| 1953 |
Magnetic Core Memory developed. |
| 1954 |
FORTRAN (FORmula TRANslation) development started by John Backus and
his team at IBM - continuing until 1957. FORTRAN is a programming
language, used for Scientific programming. |
| 1956 |
First conference on Artificial Intelligence held at Dartmouth College
in New Hampshire. |
| 1956 |
Edsger Dijkstra invented an efficient algorithm for shortest paths in
graphs as a demonstration of the abilities of the ARMAC computer. |
| 1957 |
First Dot Matrix printer marketed by IBM. |
| 1957 |
FORTRAN development finished. See 1954. |
| 1957 |
"I have travelled the length and breadth of this country and talked
with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad
that won't last out the year." The editor in charge of business books for
Prentice Hall. |
| 1958 |
LISP (interpreted language) developed, Finished in 1960. LISP stands
for 'LISt Processing', but some call it 'Lots of Irritating and Stupid
Parenthesis' due to the huge number of confusing nested brackets used in
LISP programs. Used in A.I. development. Developed by John McCarthy at
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. |
| 1958 - September 12 |
The integrated circuit invented by Jack St Clair Kilby at Texas
Instruments. Robert Noyce, who later set up Intel, also worked separately
on the invention. Intel later went on to invent perfect the
microprocessor. The patent was applied for in 1959 and granted in 1964.
This patent wasn't accepted by Japan so Japanese businesses could avoid
paying any fees, but in 1989 - after a 30 year legal battle - Japan
granted the patent; so all Japanese companies paid fees up until the year
2001 - long after the patent became obsolete in the rest of the World! |
| 1959 |
Computers built between 1959 and 1964 are often regarded as 'Second
Generation' computers, based on transistors and printed circuits -
resulting in much smaller computers. More powerful, the second generation
of computers could handle interpreters such as FORTRAN (for science) or
COBOL (for business), that accepting English-like commands, and so were
much more flexible in their applications. |
| 1959 |
COBOL (COmmon Business-Orientated Language) was developed, the initial
specifications being released in April 1960. |
| 1960 |
ALGOL - first structured, procedural, language to be released. |
| 1960 |
Tandy Corporation founded by Charles Tandy. |
| 1961 |
APL programming language released by Kenneth Iverson at IBM. |
| 1964 |
Computers built between 1964 and 1972 are often regarded as 'Third
Generation' computers, they are based on the first integrated circuits -
creating even smaller machines. Typical of such machines was the IBM 360
series mainframe, while smaller minicomputers began to open up computing
to smaller businesses. |
| 1964 |
Programming language PL/1 released by IBM. |
| 1964 |
Launch of IBM 360 - the first series of compatible computers. |
| 1964 |
DEC PDP-8 Mini Computer. The First Minicomputer, built by Digital
EquipmentCost (DEC) it cost $16,000 to buy. |
| 1965 |
Moore's law published by Gordon Moore in the 35th Anniversary edition
of Electronics magazine. Originally suggesting processor complexity every
year the law was revised in 1975 to suggest a doubling in complexity every
two years. |
| 1965 |
Fuzzy Logic designed by Lofti Zadeh (University of Berkeley,
California), it is used to process approximate data - such as 'about 100'. |
| 1965 |
BASIC (Beginners All Purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) developed at
Dartmouth College, USA, by Thomas E. Kurtz and John Kemeny. Not
implemented on microcomputers until 1975. It is often used in education to
teach programming, and also at home by beginners. |
| 1965 |
Mouse conceived by Douglas Englebart, not to become popular until 1983
with the Apple computers and not adopted by IBM until 1987 - although
compatible computers such as the Amstrad PC 1512 were fitted with mice
before this date. |
| 1965 |
The first supercomputer, the Control Data CD6600, was developed. |
| 1967 |
Development on PASCAL started, to be finished in 1971. Based on ALGOL.
Developed by Niklaus Wirth. It's use exploded after the introduction of
Turbo Pascal, by Borland, in 1984 - a high speed and low cost compiler. It
is used for a wide variety of tasks, it contains many features, is well
structured and easy to learn. Borland Pascal v7.0 included an
implementation of Object-Orientated programming (similar to C++). |
| 1968 |
Intel founded by Robert Noyce and a few friends. |
| 1968 |
LOGO programming language developed by Seymour Papert and team at MIT. |
| 1968 |
"But what ... is it good for?" Engineer at the Advanced Computing
Systems Division of IBM commenting on the microchip. |
| 1969 |
ARPANET Started by the US Dept. of Defence for research into
networking. It is the original basis for what now forms the Internet. It
was opened to non-military users later in the 1970s and many universities
and large businesses went on-line. US Vice-president Al-Gore was the first
to call it the Information superhighway. |
| 1969 - April 7 |
The first RFC, RFC0001 published. The RFCs (network working group,
Request For Comment) are a series of papers which are used to develop and
define protocols for networking, originally the basis for ARPANET there
are now thousands of them applying to all aspects of the Internet.
Collectively they document everything about the way the Internet and
computers on it should behave, whether it's TCP/IP networking or how email
headers should be written there will be a set of RFCs describing
it. |
| 1969 |
Introduction of RS-232 (serial interface) standard by EIA (Electronic
Industries Association). |
| 1970 |
First RAM chip introduced by Intel. It was called to 1103 and had a
capacity of 1 K-bit, 1024 bits. |
| 1970 |
Development of UNIX operating system started. It was later released as
C source code to aid portability, and subsequently versions are obtainable
for many different computers, including the IBM PC. It and it's clones
(such as Linux) are still widely used on network and Internet servers.
Originally developed by Ken Thomson and Dennis Ritchie. |
| 1970 |
'Forth' programming language developed. |
| 1970 - June |
Steve Geller, Ray Holt and a team from AiResearch and American
Microsystems completed development of a flight data processor for the US
Navy's F14A `TomCat' fighter jet. This processor used LSI chips to produce
a fast and powerfull programmable computer that fitted into the very tight
space restrictions of the aircraft. |
| 1971 - November 15 |
First microprocessor,
the 4004, developed by Marcian E. Hoff for Intel, was released. It
contains the equivalent of 2300 transistors and was a 4 bit processor. It
is capable of around 60,000 Interactions per second (0.06 MIPs), running
at a clock rate of 108KHz. |
| 1971 |
Development of PASCAL finished - see 1967. |
| 1972 |
Atari founded (as Syzygy) by Nolan Bushnell, who designed pong (see
also 1972). |
| 1972 |
Pong released - widely recognised as the first popular arcade video
game. It was invented by Atari's founder, Nolan Bushnell, and briefly
became reasonably popular. However it's lack of excitement or variation
meant it never captivated players like Space Invaders (1978) or other
arcade games of the 1980s. |
| 1972 |
Computers built after 1972 are often called 'fourth generation'
computers, based on LSI (Large Scale Integration) of circuits (such as
microprocessors) - typically 500 or more components on a chip. Later
developments include VLSI (Very Large Scale Integration) of integrated
circuits 5 years later - typically 10,000 components. Modern circuits may
now contain millions of components. This has led to very small, yet
incredibly powerful computers. The fourth generation is generally viewed
as running right up until the present, since although computing power has
increased the basic technology has remained virtually the same. By the
late 1990s many people began to suspect that this technology was reaching
its limit, further miniaturisation could only achieve so much. 64 megabit
RAM chips have circuitry so small that it can be measured in atoms,
circuits this small pose many technical problems - notably the heat
created but they are also very susceptible to influence by temperature or
radiation. It has been argued fifth generation computers are based on
parallel processing and VLSI integration - but are still being developed
and I'd be wary of writing the history books until the history has
actually occured! Besides computers need to be massively parallel before
they give a significant enough advantage to warrent a new generation of
computing. |
| 1972 |
C programming language developed at The Bell Laboratories in the USA by
Dennis Ritche (one of the inventors of the UNIX operating system), it's
predecessor was the B programming language - also from The Bell
Laboratories. It is a very popular language, especially for systems
programming - as it is flexible and fast. C++, allowing for
Object-Orientated Programming, was introduced in early 1980s. |
| 1972 |
First Handheld scientific calculator released by Hewlett-Packard, the
engineer's slide rule is at last obsolete. |
| 1972 - April 1 |
8008 Processor released by Intel. |
| 1972 |
The first international connections to ARPANET are established.
ARPANET later became the basis for what we now call the internet. |
| 1973 |
Prolog developed at the University of Luminy-Marseilles in France by
Alain Colmerauer. It is often used for AI programming. |
| 1973 |
Ethernet developed, this became a vero popular way of connecting PCs
and other computers together - to enable them to share data, and devices
such as printers. A group of machines connected together in this way is
known as a LAN. |
| 1974 |
CLIP-4, the first computer with a parallel architecture. |
| 1974 - April 1 |
Introduction of 8080. An 8 Bit Microprocessor from Intel. |
| 1974 - December |
MITS Altair 8800, the first personal computer to be available
commercially released, by Micro Instrumentation Telemetry Systems. In
December 1974 an article in 'Popular Electronics' inviting people to order
kits for the computer, based on the Intel 8080 they cost just $397 each
and despite the limited memory (256 bytes) and limited processing power
around 200 were ordered on the first day. |
| 1975 |
First implementation of BASIC by Bill Gates and Paul Allen, it was
written for the MITS Altair - the first personal computer - this led to
the formation of Microsoft later in the year. |
| 1975 |
Unix marketed (see 1970). |
| 1975 |
Formation of Microsoft by Bill Gates and Paul Allen. It is now one of
the most powerful and successful computing companies, a distinct
improvement on the pair's original company, Traf-O-Data, which made car
counters for highway departments. In just 3 years it achieved revenues of
$500,000 and employed 15 people. By 1992 this had increased to revenues of
2.8 billion (50% of which are from exports), and over 10,000 employees - a
fantastic feat for a company less than 20 years old. Microsoft's big break
was when they were asked to write the operating system for the I.B.M. PC,
released in 1981. Although financially not as large as IBM, Microsoft has
a huge amount of influence in the Computing Industry. |
| 1975 |
IBM 5100 released. |
| 1976 |
Apple Computer, Inc. founded, to Market Apple I computer. Designed by
Stephen Wozniak and Stephen Jobs. |
| 1976 |
First laser printer introduced by IBM - the IBM 3800. The first colour
versions came onto the market in 1988. |
| 1976? |
Introduction of 8085. |
| 1976 |
Z80 released by Zilog, and the basis for the computer boom in the
early 1980s. It was an 8 bit microprocessor. CP/M was written for the Z80
as well as software like Wordstar and dBase II - and it formed the basis
for the Sinclair Spectrum of 1982. |
| 1976 |
6502, 8 bit microprocessor developed and later chosen to equip the
Apple II computer. Also fitted in the original Acorn machine, BBC Micro,
Commodore 64 and Commodore PET. |
| 1976 |
Cray 1, the first commercially developed Supercomputer, it contained
200,000 integrated circuits and was freon-cooled. It could perform 150
million floating point operations per second - it is now the basis of an
informal measurement of the power Supercomputers, by the mid-1990s these
had reached the 1000-'cray' mark! Supercomputers are also measured by the
number of floating point operations they can do in a second, but this
figure can be misleading as the definition of a floating point operation
is open to some debate - but these operations are far more complicated
than integer operations normally handled by Microcomputers. In 1992 the
fastest Computer was the Cray-2, which can do around 250 million floating
point operations per seconds. Cray have continued to develop even more
powerful computers, such as the Cray Y-MP/832.
Such Supercomputers are used for weather forecasting, complex maths and
physics problems, and animation in modern films. |
| 1977 |
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." Ken
Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp.. |
| 1977 |
Historically Arpanet computers had communicated via a 'Network Control
Protocol' but this protocol was inadequate and had serious problems,
especially when dealing with busier networks. TCP was first outlined in a
paper by Bob Kahn (from Standford) and Vinton Cerf (from DARPA) in 1974.
In 1978 the IP header was split off from TCP, allowing network routers to
deal with just the (much simpler) IP protocol. On January 1 1983 the
internet is defined as the collection of computers communicating via
TCP/IP. |
| 1977 - May |
Apple II computer introduced. |
| 1978 - June 8 |
Introduction of 8086 by
Intel, the first commercially successful 16 bit processor. It was too
expensive to implement in early computers, so an 8 bit version was
developed (the 8088), which was chosen by IBM for the first IBM PC. This
ensured the success of the x86 family of processors that succeeded the
8086 since they and their clones are used in every IBM PC compatible
computer.
The available clock frequencies are 4.77, 8 and 10 MHz. It has an
instruction set of about 300 operations. At introduction the fastest
processor was the 8 MHz version which achieved 0.8 MIPs and contained
29,000 transistors. |
| 1978 |
Arcade Video game 'Space Invaders' released, starting a video game
craze that has continued ever since. In 1979 Atari's Asteroids proved
incredibly popular - one notable improvement over Space Invaders was that
it allowed the players to record hi-scores, for other players to spend
hours trying to beat. By 1982 many of the 'classics' had been released,
defender and pac-man, to name a few. The industry was worth $5 billion a
year - more than the U.S. movie industry. Although Pong, of 1973, and
similar games had been around for several years none were really
interesting enough to capture the public - Space Invaders, however, had
everything, in a fast action game that pitted you against the computer. |
| 1979 |
Language Ada introduced by Jean Ichbiah and team at Honeywell. |
| 1979 - June 1 |
Introduction of 8088, a step down from the 8086 as it contains just an
8 bit data bus - but this makes it cheaper to implement in computers. |
| 1979 |
Commodore PET released. Based on a 1 MHz 6502
processor it displayed monochrome text on a 9" monitor and had just 8 Kb
of RAM. Programs were loaded from audio cassette. Priced £569. For £776
you could purchase a version with 16 Kb of RAM, while for £914 you could
get a 32 Kb of RAM. |
| 1979 |
compact disk was invented. |
| 1979 |
The 68000 Microprocessor launched by Motorola. Used by Apple for the
Macintosh and by Atari for the ST series. Later versions of the processor
include the 68020 used in the Macintosh II. |
| 1979 |
IBM saw it's computer market dominance being eaten into by the new
personal computers, such as the Apple and the Commodore PET. IBM therefore
started work on their own P.C. This computer had to be a state-of-the-art
machine in order to compete, but had to be produced very quickly due to
the amazing growth of competitors. It was therefore decided to use many
third party parts to reduce development time, and Microsoft were
commissioned to write the Operating System (see October 1980). When
finished this computer was released as the IBM PC. on 12 August 1981 |
| 1980 |
"DOS addresses only 1 Megabyte of RAM because we cannot imagine any
applications needing more." Microsoft on the development of DOS. |
| 1980 - October |
Development of MS-DOS/PC-DOS began. Microsoft (known mainly for their
programming languages) were commissioned to write the Operating System for
the PC, Digital Research failed to get the contract (there is much legend
as to the real reason for this). DR's Operating System, CP/M-86 was later
shipped but it was actually easier to adapter older CP/M programs to DOS
rather than CP/M-86, and CP/M-86 cost $495. As Microsoft didn't have an
operating system to sell they bought Seattle Computer Product's 86-DOS
which had been written by Tim Paterson earlier that year (86-DOS was also
know as Q-DOS, Quick & Dirty Operating System, it was a more-or-less
16bit version of CP/M). The rights were actually bought in July 1981. It
is reputed that IBM found over 300 bugs in the code when they subjected
the operating system to their testing, and re-wrote much of the code.
Tim Paterson's DOS 1.0 was 4000 lines of assembler. |
| 1980 - Early |
Sinclair ZX80 was released for under £100. |
| 1981 - April |
The Xerox 8010 ('Star') System, the first commerical system to use a
WIMP (Windows, Icons, Menus and Pointing Devices) graphic user interface -
from which all modern WIMP and Windowing systems have evolved. Apple used
these concepts when designing the interface for the Apple Macintosh (see
January 1984), and later alleged that Microsoft copied their 'look and
feel' when designing Microsoft Windows.
The Xerox 'Star' was the commercialisation of the 'Alto', which had
available internally inside Xerox PARC since 1973. Sales of the 'Star'
were terrible and the system rapidly fell into obscurity. |
| 1981 |
"640k ought to be enough for anybody.", Bill Gates |
| 1981 |
Sinclair ZX81 was released, for a similar price to the ZX80 (see
1980). |
| 1981? |
Introduction of 80186/80188. These are rarely used on PCs as they
incorporate a built in DMA and timer chip - and thus have register
addresses incompatible with other IBM PCs. |
| 1981 - August 12 |
IBM Announced PC, the standard model was sold for $2880. This had 64Kb
of RAM, a mono display and the cassette drive was an optional extra. Two
160Kb single sided floppy drives could be added. The machines success was
largely due to the openness of it's specification, anyone could produce
new and improved parts or models of the computer - the original IBM PC
usually had an INTEL processor, Tandon disk drives and an operating system
from Microsoft. 100,000 orders were taken by Christmas. The first one sold
in the U.K. cost £2080. An option of operating systems was actually
available, but IBM/Microsoft's PC-DOS was by far the cheapest at $39.95. |
| 1981 - August 12 |
MDA (Mono Display Adapter, text only) introduced with IBM PC. |
| 1981 - August 12 |
MS-DOS 1.0., PC-DOS 1.0.
Microsoft (known mainly for their programming languages) were
commissioned by IBM to write the operating system, they bought a program
called 86-DOS from Tim Paterson which was loosely based on CP/M 80. The
final program from Microsoft was marketed by IBM as PC-DOS and by
Microsoft as MS-DOS, collaboration on subsequent versions continued until
version 5.0 in 1991.
Compared to modern versions of DOS version 1 was very basic, the most
notable difference was the presence of just 1 directory, the root
directory, on each disk. Subdirectories were not supported until version
2.0 (March, 1983).
MS-DOS (and PC-DOS) was the main operating system for all IBM-PC
compatible computers until 1995 when Windows '95 began to take over the
market, and Microsoft turned its back on MS-DOS (leaving MS-DOS 6.22 from
1993 as the last version written - although the DOS Shell in Windows '95
calls itself MS-DOS version 7.0, and has some improved features like long
filename support). According to Microsoft, in 1994, MS-DOS was running on
some 100 million computers world-wide. |
| 1981 |
Pacman was written. Originally it was going to be called Puckman, but
the name was changed to reduce the damage that could be done by changing
the P to an F with a black marker. |
| 1982 |
The TCP/IP Protocol established, this is the protocol that carries
most of the information across the Internet. |
| 1982 |
Introduction of BBC Micro. Based on the 6502 processor it was a very
popular computer for British schools up to the development of the Acorn
Archimedes (in 1987). In 1984 the government offered to pay half the cost
of such computers in an attempt to promote their use in secondary
education. |
| 1982 - January |
Commodore 64 released, costing just $595. |
| 1982 - February 1 |
80286 Released. It supports clock frequencies of up to 20 MHz and
implements a new mode of operation, protected mode - allowing access to
more memory (up to 16 Mbytes compared to 1 MB for the 8086. The virtual
address space can appear to be up to 1 GB through the use of virtual
memory). It includes an extended instruction set to cope with this new
mode of operation.
At introduction the fastest version ran at 12.5 MHz, achieved 2.7 MIPs
and contained 134,000 transistors. |
| 1982 |
Compaq released their IBM PC compatible Compaq Portable. |
| 1982 |
MIDI, Musical Instrument Digital Interface, (pronounced "middy")
published by International MIDI Association (IMA). The MIDI standard
allows computers to be connected to instruments like keyboards. |
| 1982 |
Red Book on Audio CDs was introduced by Sony and Phillips. This was
the beginning of the Compact Disk, it was released in Japan and then in
Europe and America a year later. |
| 1982 - March |
MS-DOS 1.25, PC-DOS 1.1 |
| 1982 - April |
The Sinclair ZX Spectrum was announced, released later in the year. It
is based on the Z80 chip from Zilog, it ran at 3.5 MHz and had an 8 colour
graphics display. You could by a 16 Kb version for £125 or a 48 Kb version
for £175 - remarkable prices when compared to the £1000+ IBM PC. |
| 1982 - May |
IBM launch the double-sided 320K floppy disk drives. |
| 1982 - December |
IBM buy 12% of Intel. |
| 1983 - January |
IBM PC gets European launch at Which Computer Show. |
| 1983 - January |
Apple announced their 'LISA' computer in January, to be released in
June. The LISA was one of the first computers to be sold with a GUI
(graphical user interface), however it did not sell well. The main
problems were the 10 thousand dollar price tag and the slow interface -
the GUI based operating system struggled on the 5 MHz CPU. The GUI was
based on ideas gained by Steve Jobs who saw the Alto while visting Xerox
PARC. |
| 1983 |
Borland Formed. |
| 1983 - Spring |
IBM XT released, it was fitted with the 8086 (which could be replaced
with an NEC V20 or V30) and had room for an 8087 maths co-processor to be
installed. It also had a 10Mb hard disk, 128K of RAM, one floppy drive,
mono monitor and a printer, all for $5000. |
| 1983 - March |
MS-DOS 2.0, PC-DOS 2.0
Introduced with the IBM XT this version
included a UNIX style hierarchical sub-directory structure, and altered
the way in which programs could load and access files on the disk. |
| 1983 - May |
MS-DOS 2.01 |
| 1983 - October |
IBM released PC Junior in an attempt to get further into the home
market, it cost just $699. Cheaper alternatives from other companies were
more preferable to the home buyer, but businesses continued to buy IBM.
However this meant that the PC Jr. was not a great sucess. |
| 1983 - October |
PC-DOS 2.1 (for PC Jr). Like the PC Jr this was not a great success
and quickly disappeared from the market. |
| 1983 - October |
MS-DOS 2.11 |
| 1984 |
DNS (Domain Name Server) introduced to the Internet, which then
consisted of about 1000 hosts. |
| 1984 |
Turbo Pascal Introduced by Borland (see PASCAL, 1967). |
| 1984 |
Hewlett-Packard release the immensely popular Laserjet printer, by
1993 they had sold over 10 million Laserjet printers and over 20 million
printers overall. HP were also pioneering inkjet technology. |
| 1984 - January |
Apple Macintosh Released. Based on the 8 MHz version of the Motorola
68000 processor. The 68000 can address 16 Mb of RAM, a noticeable
improvement over Intel's 8088/8086 family. The Apple achieved 0.7 MIPs and
originally came with just 128Kb of RAM. It was fitted with a monochrome
video adapter. |
| 1984 |
IBM AT released. This incorporates a larger (16-bit) bus for expansion
slots. Unfortunately it wasn't well specified, the ISA standard was
eventually made (in 1991) to cope with this - but not until some ATs had
been produced with buses that run far quicker the 8.33 MHz laid down in
the ISA standard. Some AT compatible systems designed before the standard
was introduced ran the bus at 12.5 MHz which causes some expansion cards
to run hot, therefore becoming less efficient and slower therefore
eventually 'tripping over' and violently crashing the computer. |
| 1984 - August |
MS-DOS 3.0, PC-DOS 3.0
Released for the IBM AT, it supported larger
hard disks as well as High Density (1.2 MB) 5¼" floppy disks. |
| 1984 - September |
Apple released a 512KB version of the Macintosh - but there were no
other major enhancements over the original (see Jan. 1984). |
| 1984 - October |
Sinclair ZX Spectrum+ released. Similar specifications to the 48 Kb
version of the original ZX (see April 1982) it cost £179. |
| 1984 - End |
Compaq started the development of the IDE interface (see also 1989).
IDE = Intelligent Drive Electronics. This standard was designed specially
for the IBM PC and can achieve high data transfer rates through a 1:1
interleave factor and caching by the actual disk controller - the
bottleneck is often the old AT bus and the drive may read data far quicker
than the bus can accept it, so the cache is used as a buffer.
Theoretically 1MB/s is possible but 700KB/s is perhaps more typical of
such drives. This standard has been adopted by many other models of
computer, such the Acorn Archimedes A4000 and above. A later improvement
was EIDE, laid down in 1989, which also removed the maximum drive size of
528MB and increased data transfer rates. |
| 1985 - January |
Postscript introduced by Adobe Systems, used in the Apple Laserwriter
printer. Adopted by IBM for their use in March 1987. |
| 1985 |
Tetris was written by Russian Alexey Pazhitnov. It was later released
for various western games machines, the jewel in the crown being it's
inclusion with Nintendo's Gameboy in 1989. Alexey made nothing from the
game, since under the Communist Regime it was owned by the people -
although after the collapse of Communism he was able to move to the USA
where he now works for Microsoft. |
| 1985 |
CD-ROM, invented by Phillips, produced in collaboration with Sony. |
| 1985 |
EGA released. |
| 1985 - March |
MS-DOS 3.1, PC-DOS 3.1
This was the first version of DOS to provide
network support, and provides some new functions to handle networking. |
| 1985 - May |
Sinclair ZX Spectrum 128 announced, released in February 1986. See
Feb. 1986. |
| 1985 - October 17 |
80386
DX released. It supports clock frequencies of up to 33 MHz and can address
up to 4 GB of memory and virtual memory of up to 64 TERABYTES! It also
includes a bigger instruction set than the 80286.
At the date of release the fastest version ran at 20 MHz and achieved
6.0 MIPs. It contained 275,000 transistors. |
| 1985 - October |
Version 2.25 included support for foreign character sets, and was
marketed in the Far East. |
| 1985 - November |
Microsoft Windows Launched. Not really widely used until version 3,
released in 1990, Windows required DOS to run and so was not a complete
operating system (until Windows '95, released on August 21, 1995). It
merely provided a G.U.I. similar to that of the Macintosh., in fact so
similar that Apple tried to sue Microsoft for copying the 'look and feel'
of their operating system. This court case was not dropped until August
1997. |
| 1985 - December |
MS-DOS 3.2, PC-DOS 3.2
This version was the first to support 3½" disks, although only the
720KB ones. Version 3.2 remained the standard version until 1987 when
version 3.3 was released with the IBM PS/2. |
| 1985 - End |
LIM EMS (memory standard) introduced by Lotus, Intel and Microsoft.
The first version introduced was version 3.2! |
| 1986 - January |
Apple released another enhanced version of the Macintosh (the
Macintosh Plus) - this one could cope with 4 Mb of RAM and had a SCSI
adapter. |
| 1986 - February |
Sinclair ZX Spectrum 128 released. It had 128 Kb of RAM, but little
other improvement over the original ZX (except improved sound
capabilities). Later models were produced by Amstrad - but they showed no
major advances in technology. |
| 1986 - April |
Apple released another version of the Macintosh (the Macintosh 512Ke)
which was basically the same as the 512K of Sept. 1984. |
| 1986 - September |
Amstrad Announced Amstrad PC 1512, a cheap and powerful PC. Cost was
just under £1000, it included a slightly enhanced CGA graphics adapter,
512Kb RAM (upgradable to 640Kb), 8086 processor (upgradable to NEC V30)
and a 20Mb harddisk (optional). Amstrad had previous success with the PCW. To
ensure the computer was accessible they made sure the manuals could be
read by everyone, and also included DR's GEM desktop (a WIMP system) and a
mouse to try to make to machine more user friendly. It was sold in many
high street shops and was a complete success, being bought by Business and
Home users alike. N.B. This was the author's family's first Home computer,
with a Monochrome monitor and harddisk it cost just under £1000. |
| 1987? |
Introduction of Acorn Archimedes. |
| 1987 |
Connection Machine, an interesting supercomputer which instead of
integration of circuits operates up to 64,000 fairly ordinary
microprocessors - using parallel architecture - at the same time, in its
most powerful form it can do somewhere in the region of 2 billion
operations per second. |
| 1987 |
Microsoft Windows 2 released. It was more popular than the original
version but it was nothing special mind you, Windows 3 (see 1990) was the
first really useful version. |
| 1987 |
Fractal Image Compression Algorithm calculated by English
mathematician Michael F. Barnsley, allowing digital images to be
compressed and stored using fractal codes rather than normal image data.
In theory this allows more efficient storage of the images. |
| 1987 - March 2 |
Macintosh II & Macintosh SE released. The SE was still based on the
68000, but could cope with 4 Mb of RAM and had a SCSI adapter, similar
specifications to the Macintosh Plus of Jan. 1986.
The Macintosh II was based on the newer Motorola 68020, that ran at 16
MHz and achieved a much more respectable 2.6 MIPs (comparable to an
80286). It too had a SCSI adapter but was also fitted with a colour video
adapter. |
| 1987 - April 2 |
PS/2 Systems introduced by IBM. The first models were
released on this date. The PS/2 Model 30 based on an 8086 processor and an
old XT bus, Models 50 and 60 based on the 80286 processor and the Model 80
based on the 80386 processor. These used the 3 1/2" 'microfloppies',
storing 1.44Mb on each (although the Model 30 could only use the low 720Kb
density). These systems (except the Model 30) included a completely new
bus, the MCA (Micro Channel Architecture) bus, which did not catch on as
it did not provide support for old-style 16-Bit AT bus expansion cards.
The MCA bus did show many improvements in design and speed over the ISA
bus most PCs used, and IBM (if no-one else) still use it in some of their
machines. The PS/2 series were very successful - selling well over 2
million machines in less than 2 years. |
| 1987 |
VGA released (designed for the PS/2) by IBM. |
| 1987 |
MCGA released (only for low end PS/2s, i.e. the Model 30) by IBM. |
| 1987 |
The 8514/A introduced by IBM. This was a graphics card that included
it's own processor to speed up the drawing of common objects, to take the
load othe main CPU. |
| 1987 - April |
MS-DOS 3.3, PC-DOS 3.3
Released with the IBM PS/2 this version
included support for the High Density (1.44MB) 3½" disks. It also
supported hard disk partitions, splitting a hard disk into 2 or more
logical drives. |
| 1987 - April |
OS/2 Launched by Microsoft and IBM. A later enhancement, OS/2 Warp
provided many of the 32-bit enhancements boasted by Windows '95 - but
several years earlier, yet the product failed to dominate the market in
the way Windows '95 did 8 year later. |
| 1987 - August |
AD-LIB soundcard released. Not widely supported until a software
company, Taito, released several games fully supporting AD-LIB - the word
then spread how much the special sound effects and music enhanced the
games.
Adlib, a Canadian Company, had a virtual monopoly until 1989 when the
SoundBlaster card was released. |
| 1987 - October/November |
Compaq DOS (CPQ-DOS) v3.31 released to cope with disk partitions
>32MB. Used by some other OEMs, but not distributed by Microsoft. |
| 1987 - End |
LIM EMS v4.0 |
| 1988 |
First optical chip developed, it uses light instead of electricity to
increase processing speed. |
| 1988 |
XMS (memory standard) introduced. |
| 1988 |
EISA Bus standard introduced. |
| 1988 |
WORM (Write Once Read Many times) - disks marketed for first time by
IBM. |
| 1988 - June 16 |
80386 SX released as a cheaper alternative -to the 80386 DX. It had a
narrower (16 bit) time multiplexed bus. This reduction in pins, and the
easier integration with 16 bit devices made the cost savings. |
| 1988 - July/August? |
PC-DOS 4.0, MS-DOS 4.0
Version 3.4 - 4.x are confusing due to lack of correlation between IBM
& Microsoft and also the USA & Europe. Several 'Internal Use only'
versions were also produced.
This version reflected increases in hardware capabilities, it supported
hard drives greater than 32 MB (up to 2 GB) and also EMS memory.
This version was not properly tested and was bug ridden, causing system
crashes and loss of data. The original release was IBM's, but Microsoft's
version 4.0 (in October) was no better and version 4.01 was released (in
November) to correct this, then version 4.01a (in April 1989) as a further
improvement. However many people could not trust this and reverted to
version 3.3 while they waited for the complete re-write (version 5 - 3
years later). Beta's of Microsoft's version 4.0 were apparently shipped as
early as '86 & '87. |
| 1988 - September |
IBM PS/2 Model 30 286 released, based on an 80286 processor and the
old AT bus - IBM abandoned the MCA bus, released less than 18 months
earlier! Other IBM machines continued to use the MCA bus. |
| 1988 - October |
Common Access Method committee (CAM) formed. They published the ATA
standard on the 1st of April 1989 (IDE/ATA disks had been around for a
while but wasn't previously standardised), along with enhancements to
allow for larger disks that before. |
| 1988 - October |
Macintosh IIx released. It was based on a new processor, the Motorola
68030. It still ran at 16 MHz but now achieved 3.9 MIPs. It could now cope
with 128 MB of RAM. |
| 1988 - November |
MS-DOS 4.01, PC-DOS 4.01
This corrected many of the bugs seen in
version 4.0, but many users simply switched back to version 3.3 and waited
for a properly re-written and fully tested version - which did not come
until version 5 in June 1991. Support for disk partitions >32Mb. |
| 1989 |
World Wide Web, invented by Tim Berners-Lee who saw the need for a
global information exchange that would allow physicists to collaborate on
research (he was working at CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory
in Switzerland, at the time). The Web was a result of the integration of
hypertext and the Internet. The hyperlinked pages not only provided
information but provide transparent access to older Internet facilities
such as ftp, telnet, Gopher, WAIS and USENET. He was awarded the Institute
of Physics' 1997 Duddell Medal for this contribution to the advancement of
knowledge. The Web started as a text-only interface, but NCSA Mosaic later
presented a graphical interface for it and it's popularity exploded as it
became accessible to the novice user. This explosion started in ernest
during 1993, a year in which web traffic over the Internet increased by
300,000%. |
| 1989 |
CD-I released by Phillips and Sony. |
| 1989 - January |
Macintosh SE/30 released. Like the SE of March 1987 it only had a
monochrome display adapter but was fitted with the newer 68030 processor. |
| 1989 - April 1 |
Command set for E-IDE drives was defined by CAM (formed Oct. 1988).
This supports drives over 528MB in size. Early controllers often imposed a
limit of 2.1GB, then later ones 8.4GB. Newer controllers support much
higher capacities. Drives greater in size than 2.1GB must be partitioned
under DOS since the drive structure (laid down in MS-DOS 4) used by DOS
and even Windows '95 prevents partitions bigger than 2.1GB. EIDE
controllers also support the ATAPI interface that is used by most CD-ROM
drives produced after it's introduction. Newer implementations to EIDE,
designed for the PCI bus, can achieve data transfer at up to 16.67 MB/s. A
later enhancement, called UDMA, allows transfer rates of up to 33.3 MB/s. |
| 1989 - March |
The Macintosh IIcx released, with the same basic capabilities of the
IIx. |
| 1989 - April 10 |
80486
DX released by Intel. It contains the equivalent of about 1.2 million
transistors. At the time of release the fastest version ran at 25 MHz and
achieved up to 20 MIPs.
Later versions, such as the DX/2 and DX/4 versions achieved internal
clock rates of up to 100 MHz. |
| 1989 - September |
Macintosh IIci released based on a faster version of the 68030 - now
running at 25 MHz, and achieved 6.3 MIPs. Macintosh also released the
portable - which went back to the original 68000 processor (but now ran it
at 16 MHz to achieve 1.3 MIPs). It had a monochrome display. |
| 1989 - November |
Release of Sound Blaster Card, by Creative Labs, its success was
ensured by maintaining compatibility with the widely supported AD-LIB
soundcard of 1987. |
| 1990 |
Consortium of major SVGA card manufactures (called Video Electronic
Standard Association, VESA) was formed and then introduced VESA SVGA
Standard. |
| 1990 - March |
Macintosh IIfx released. Based on a 40 MHz version of the 68030 it
achieved 10 MIPs. It also featured a faster SCSI adapter, which could
transfer 3.0 Mb/sec. |
| 1990 - May 22 |
Introduction of Windows 3.0 by Bill Gates & Microsoft. It is true
multitasking (or pretends to be on computers less than an 80386, by
operating in 'Real' mode) system. It maintained compatibility with MS-DOS,
on an 80386 it even allows such programs to multitask - which they were
not designed to do. This created a real threat to the Macintosh and
despite a similar product, IBM's OS/2, it was very successful. Various
improvements were made, versions 3.1, 3.11 - but the next major step did
not come until Windows '95 in 1995 which relied much more heavily on the
features of the 80386 and provided support for 32 bit applications. |
| 1990 - October |
Macintosh Classic released, an identical replacement to the Macintosh
Plus of January 1986. Also came the Macintosh IIsi which ran a 68030
processor at 20 MHz to achieve 5.0 MIPs, and also a 256 colour video
adapter. |
| 1990 - November |
Macintosh LC released. This ran a 68020 processor at 16 MHz to achieve
2.6 MIPs, it had a slightly improved SCSI adapter and a 256 colour video
adapter. |
| 1990 - November |
MPC (Multimedia PC) Level 1 specification published by a council of
companies including Microsoft and Creative Labs. This specified the
minimum standards for a Multimedia IBM PC. The MPC level 1 specification
originally required a 80286/12 MHz PC, but this was later increased to a
80386SX/16 MHz computer as an 80286 was realised to be inadequate. It also
required a CD-ROM drive capable of 150 KB/sec (single speed) and also of
Audio CD output. Companies can, after paying a fee, use the MPC logo on
their products. |
| 1990 - November |
ATA spec. final proposal submitted to ANSI. |
| 1991 |
Introduction of ISA standard, although it was simply called the AT bus
until after competing standards were launched that needed differentiating.
Although the the AT bus had been used for many years it hadn't been
properly standardised, causing all sorts of problems as newer PCs clocked
the bus at ever faster speeds. |
| 1991 |
Borland took over Ashton-Tate Corporation & the Dbase program used
by many businesses and individuals. |
| 1991 - April 22 |
80486 SX
released as cheaper alternative to 80486 DX - the key difference being the
lack of an integrated F.P.U. |
| 1991 - May |
Introduction of Sound Blaster Pro. |
| 1991 - June |
MS-DOS 5.0, PC-DOS 5.0
In order to promote OS/2 Bill Gates took every opportunity after it's
release to say 'DOS is dead', however the development of DOS 5.0 lead to
the permanent dropping of OS/2 development.
This version, after the mess of version 4, was properly tested through
the distribution of Beta versions to over 7,500 users. This version
included the ability to load device drivers and TSR programs above the
640KB boundary (into UMBs and the HMA), freeing more RAM for programs.
This version marked the end of collaboration between Microsoft and IBM on
DOS. |
| 1991 - August |
Linux is born with the following post to the Usenet Newsgroup
comp.os.minix: Hello everybody out there using minix-
I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be
big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones.
The post was by a Finnish college student, Linus Torvalds, and this
hobby grew from these humble beginnings into one of the most widely used
UNIX-like operating systems in the world today. It now runs on many
different types of computer, including the Sun SPARC and the Compaq Alpha,
as well as many ARM, MIPS, PowerPC and Motorola 68000 based computers.
In 1992, the GNU project (http://www.gnu.org/) adopted the Linux
kernel for use on GNU systems while they waited for the development of
their own (Hurd) kernel to be completed. The GNU project's aim is to
provide a complete and free UNIX like operating system, combining the
Linux or Hurd platform with the a complete suite of free software to run
on it. In order to allow it to carry the GNU name, the Linux kernel
copyright was changed to the GNU Public License Agreement (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html)
on the 1st of February 1992. |
| 1992 |
"Windows NT addresses 2 Gigabytes of RAM which is more than any
application will ever need". Microsoft on the development of Windows NT |
| 1992 |
Introduction of CD-I launched by Phillips. |
| 1992 - April |
Introduction of Windows 3.1 |
| 1992 - May |
Wolfenstein 3D released by Id Software Inc. |
| 1992 - June |
Sound Blaster 16 ASP Introduced. |
| 1993 |
Commercial providers were allowed to sell internet connections to
individuals. Its use exploded, especially with the new interface provided
by the World-Wide Web (see 1989) and NCSA Mosaic. |
| 1993 |
Doom was released by Id Software Inc. The PC began to be considered as
a serious games playing machine. This was reinforced by another release in
1993 - "Sam and Max Hit the Road". |
| 1993 |
Novell purchased Digital Research, DR-DOS became Novell DOS. |
| 1993 - March 22 |
Intel Pentium
released. At the time it was only available in 60 & 66 MHz versions
which achieved up to 100 MIPs, with over 3.1 million transistors. |
| 1993 - May |
MPC Level 2 specification introduced (see November 1990). This was
designed to allow playback of a 15 fps video in a window 320x240 pixels.
The key difference is the requirement of a CD-ROM drive capable of
300KB/sec (double speed). Also with Level 2 is the requirement for
products to be tested by the MPC council, making MPC Level 2 compatibility
a stamp of certification. |
| 1993 - December |
MS-DOS 6.0. This included a Hard-Disk compression program called
DoubleSpace, but a small computing company called 'Stac' claimed that
DoubleSpace was partly a copy of their Compression Program, Stacker. After
paying damages Microsoft withdrew DoubleSpace from MS-DOS 6.2, releasing a
new program - DriveSpace - with MS-DOS version 6.22. In operation and
programming interface DriveSpace remains virtually identical to
DoubleSpace. MS-DOS 6.22 remains the last version of MS-DOS released,
since Microsoft turned its efforts to Windows '95. Windows '95 (and later)
DOS shell reports itself as DOS 7 - and includes a few enhancements, e.g.
support for long filenames. |
| 1994 - March 7 |
Intel Release the 90 & 100 MHz versions of the Pentium Processor. |
| 1994 - March 14 |
Linus Torvalds released version 1.0 of the Linux Kernel. |
| 1994 - September |
PC-DOS 6.3 Basically the same as version 5.0 this release by IBM
included more bundled software, such as Stacker (the program that caused
Microsoft so much embarrassment) and anti-virus software. |
| 1994 - October 10 |
Intel Release the 75 MHz version of the Pentium Processor. |
| 1994 |
Doom II released. This reflected the rapidly increasing quality of
games available for the PC - an opinion supported by other major releases
in 1994, such as "Alone in the Dark 2", "Theme Park", "Magic Carpet" and
"Little Big Adventure" which also helped demonstrate the diversity of
games available on the platform. This success of the PC as a games
platform was partly due to and partly a cause of significantly increased
PC ownership among the 'general public' during the early/mid 1990s. |
| 1994 |
Netscape 1.0 was written as an alternative browser to NCSA Mosaic. |
| 1994 |
Command & Conquer released. Other (less significant releases) for
the PC included Star Trek 'The Next Generation', Full Throttle, Descent
and Terminal Velocity. The advent of 3D graphics cards from Videologic and
3Dfx helped the platform's games status further. |
| 1995 - March |
Linus released Linux Kernel v1.2.0 (Linux'95). |
| 1995 - March 27 |
Intel release the 120 MHz version of the Pentium processor. |
| 1995 - June 1 |
Intel release the 133 MHz version of the Pentium processor. |
| 1995 - August 21 [poss. 23] |
Windows '95 was launched by Bill Gates & Microsoft. Unlike
previous versions of Windows, Windows '95 is an entire operating system -
it does not rely on MS-DOS (although some remnants of the old operating
system still exist). Windows '95 was written specially for the 80386 and
compatible computers to make 'full' use of its 32 bit processing and
multitasking capabilities, and thus is much more similar to Windows NT
than Windows 3.x. Windows 95 and NT 4 are almost indistinguishable in many
respects - such as User Interface and API. Unfortunately, in order to
maintain backwards compatibility, Windows 95 doesn't impose the same
memory protection and security measures that NT does and so suffers from
much worse reliability. Despite being remarkable similar in function to
OS/2 Warp (produced by IBM and Microsoft several years earlier, but
marketed by IBM), Windows '95 has proved very popular. |
| 1995 - November 1 |
Pentium Pro released. At introduction it achieved a clock speed of up
to 200 MHz (there were also 150, 166 and 180 MHz variants released on the
same date), but is basically the same as the Pentium in terms of
instruction set and capabilities. It achieves 440 MIPs and contains 5.5
million transistors - this is nearly 2400 times as many as the first
microprocessor, the 4004 - and capable of 70,000 times as many
instructions per second. |
| 1995 - December 28 |
CompuServe blocked access to over 200 sexually explicit sites, partly
to avoid confrontation with the German Government. Access to all but 5 was
restored on Feb. 13 1996. |
| 1995 - December |
JavaScript development announced by Netscape. |
| 1996 |
Quake released - representing the dramatic increases in both software
and hardware technology since Doom, of 3 years previous. Other notable
releases included "Civilization 2", "Command & Conquer - Red Alert",
"Grand Prix 2" and "Tomb Raider". On the more controversial front "Battle
Cruiser 3000" was also released, but it's advertising had to be censored. |
| 1996 - January |
Netscape Navigator 2.0 released. First browser to support JavaScript. |
| 1996 - January 4 |
Intel release the 150 & 166 MHz versions of the Pentium Processor.
They contain the equivalent of over 3.3 million transistors. |
| 1996 |
Windows '95 OSR2 (OEM System Release 2) was released - partly to fix
bugs found in release 1 - but only to computer retailers for sale with new
systems. There were actually two separated releases of Windows 95 OSR2
before the introduction of Windows '98, the second of which contained both
USB and FAT32 support - the main selling points of Windows '98. FAT32 is a
new filing system that provides support for disk paritions bigger than
2.1GB and is better at coping with large disks (especially in terms of
wasted space). |
| 1996 - June 9 |
Linux 2.0 released. 2.0 was a significant improvement over the earlier
versions: it was the first to support multiple architectures (originally
developed for the Intel 386 processor, it now supported the Digital Alpha
and would very soon support Sun SPARC many others). It was also the first
stable kernel to support SMP, kernel modules, and much more. |
| 1996 - October 6 |
Intel release the 200 Mhz version of the Pentium Processor. |
| 1997 |
Tim Berners-Lee awarded the Institute of Physics' 1997 Duddell Medal
for inventing the World Wide Web (see 1989). |
| 1997 |
"Grand Theft Auto", "Quake 2" and "Blade Runner" were all released
while Lara Croft returned in "Tomb Raider 2". As the standards for
graphics kept increasing, 3d graphics cards were beginning to become
mandatory for games players. |
| 1997 - January 8 |
Intel released Pentium MMX (originally 166 and 200 Mhz versions), for
games and multimedia enhancement. To most people MMX is simply another
3-letter acronym and people wearing coloured suits on Intel ads, and to
programmers in meant an even further expanded instruction set that
provides, amongst other functions, enhanced 64-bit support - but software
needs to be specially written to work with the new functions. A major
rival clone, the AMD-K6-MMX containing a similar instruction set, caused a
legal challenge from Intel on the right to use the trademarked name MMX -
it was not upheld. |
| 1997 - May 11 |
IBM's Deep Blue, the first computer to beat a reigning World Chess
Champion, Gary Kasparov, in a full chess match. The computer had played
him previously - loosing 5/6 games in February 1996. |
| 1997 - May 7 |
Intel Release their Pentium II processor (233, 266 and 300 Mhz
versions). It featured, as well as an increased instruction set, a much
larger on-chip cache. |
| 1997 - June 2 |
Intel release the 233 MHz Pentium MMX. |
| 1997 - August 6 |
After 18 months of losses Apple were in serious financial trouble.
Microsoft invested in Apple, buying 100,000 non-voting shares worth $150
million - a decision not approved of by many Apple owners! One of the
conditions was that Apple were to drop their long running court case -
attempting to sue Microsoft for copying the look and feel of their
operating system when designing Windows.
There is some contention as to whether Apple were justified in sueing
Microsoft, given that they themselves used some of the ideas from the
XEROX 'Star' system when desiging their G.U.I. - however the similarities
between MacOS and Windows are much more pronouced than those between the
XEROX system and the Mac. |
| 1998 - February |
Intel released of 333 MHz Pentium II processor. Code-named Deschutes
these processors use the new 0.25 micron manufacturing process to run
faster and generate less heat than before. |
| 1998 - April |
A U.S. court has finally banned the long-running game of buying domain
names relating to trademarks and then at selling them for extortionate
prices to the companies who own the trademark. The case was based around a
man from Illinois who bought www.panavision.com in 1995 and has just tried
to sell it for $13,000. The current going commercial rate for domain name
registration is around $100. |
| 1998 - June 25 |
Microsoft released Windows '98. Some U.S. attorneys tried to block
it's release since the new O/S interfaces closely with other programs such
as Microsoft Internet Explorer and so effectively closes the market of
such software to other companies. Microsoft fought back with a letter to
the White House suggesting that 26 of it's industry allies said that a
delay in the release of the new O/S could damage the U.S. economy. The
main selling points of Windows '98 were it's support for USB and it's
support for disk paritions greater than 2.1GB. |
| 1999 - Jan 25 |
Linux Kernel 2.2.0 Released. The number of people running Linux is
estimated at over 10million, making it an not only important operating
system in the Unix world, but an increasingly important one in the PC
world. |
| 1999 - Feb 22 |
AMD release K6-III 400MHz version, 450 to OEMS. In some tests it
outperforms soon-to-be released Intel P-III. It contains approximately 23
million transistors, and is based on 100Mhz super socket 7 motherboards,
an improvement on the 66MHz buses their previous chips were based on. This
helps its performance when compared to Intel's Pentium II - which also
uses a 100MHz bus speed. |
| 1999 - Aug 31 |
Apple release the PowerMac G4. It's powered by the PowerPC G4 chip
from Apple, Motorola and IBM. Available in 400MHz, 450MHz and 500MHz
versions it's claimed to be the first personal computer to be capable of
over one billion floating-point operations per second. |
| 1999 - Nov 29 |
AMD release Athlon 750MHz version. |
| 2000 - Jan 14 |
US Government announce restrictions on exporting Cryptography are
relaxed (although not removed). This allows many US Companies to stop the
long running, and rather ridiculous process of having to create US and
International copies of their software. |
| 2000 - Jan 19 |
Transmeta launch their new 'Crusoe' chips. Designed for laptops these
prvoide comparible performance to the mid-range Pentium II chips, but
consume a tiny fraction of the power. They are a new and exciting
competitor to Intel in the x86 market. |
| 2000 - Feb 17 |
Offical Launch of Windows 2000 - Microsoft's replacement for Windows
95/98 and Windows NT. Claimed to be faster and more reliable than previous
versions of Windows. It is actually a descendant of the NT series, and so
the trade-off for increased reliability is that it won't run some old
DOS-based games. To keep the home market happy Microsoft have also
released Windows ME, the newest member of the 95/98 series. |
| 2000 - March 6 |
AMD Release the Athlon 1GHz. |
| 2000 - March 8 |
Intel release very limited supplies of the 1GHz Pentium III chip. |
| 2000 - June 20 |
British Telecom (BT) claim the rights to hyperlinks on the basis of a
US patent granted in 1989. Similar patents in the rest of the world have
now expired. Their claim is widely believed to be absurd since Ted Nelson
wrote about hyperlinks in 1965, and this is where Tim Berners Lee says he
got the ideas for the World Wide Web from. This is just another in the
line of similar incredulous cases - for example amazon.com's claim to have
patented '1-click ordering'. Even more absurb was the claim made in March
2002 by a 'til then unheard of company "Maz Technologies" that they had,
in 1998, obtained a fairly generic patent covering encrypted storage of
documents. BT's claim was finally rejected by a judge in the US on 23
August 2002. |
| 2000 - Sept 6 |
RSA Security Inc. released their RSA algorithm into the public domain,
in advance of the US patent (#4,405,829) expiring on the 20th Sept. of the
same year. Following the relaxation of the US government restrictions
earlier in the year (Jan. 14) this removed one of the last barriers to the
world-wide distribution of much software based on cryptographic systems.
It should be noted that the IDEA algorithm is still under patent and also
that government restrictions still apply in some places. |
| 2001 - Jan 4 |
Linux kernel 2.4.0 released. |
| 2001 - March 24 |
Apple released MacOS X. At it's heart is `Darwin', an Open Source
operaing system on FreeBSD. Using this MacOS X finally gives Mac users the
stabilty benifits of a protected memory architecture along many other
enhancements, such as preemptive multitasking. The BSD base also makes
porting UNIX applications to MacOS easier and gives Mac users a fully
featured command line interface alongside their GUI. |
| 2001 - October 25 |
Microsoft released Windows XP - the latest version of their Windows
operating system. Based on the NT series kernel, it is intended to bring
together both the NT/2000 series and the Windows 95/98/ME series into one
product. Of, course, it was originally hoped that this would happen with
Windows 2000 ... so only time will tell if Microsoft have suceeded with
Windows XP. |
| 2001 - November 15 |
Release of the `X' Box - Microsoft's games console. It cost $299 (or
£299 - there's fairness), and will include the ability to connect to the
internet for multiplayer gaming. The Japanese launch was the 22nd February
2000, and the European launch wasn't until March 14th 2002. |
| 2002 - August 6 |
Edsger W. Dijkstra died. Dijkstra is known to many people for his
'shortest path' algorithm (1956). Although this is the main thing many
people will remember Dijkstra for, he also made important contributions to
many areas of computing - imparticular he should be remembered for his
work on problems relating to concurrency, such as the invention of the
`semaphore'. |
| 2003 - October 24 |
MacOS 10.3 continues to improve MacOS X, with major updates to 'Aqua'
(the user interface) as well as performance improvements and new features. |
| 2003 - December 17 |
Linux kernel 2.6.0 released. Many features from uClinux (designed for
embedded microcontrollers) have been integrated, along with support for
NUMA (used in large, multi-processor systems). an improved scheduler and
scalability improvements help ensure Linux will maintain it's reputation
for running on everything from small embedded devices to large
enterprise-class servers and even mainframes. As always support for new
classes of hardware has been significantly improved. |
| 2003 - December 31 |
Sir Tim Berners-Lee was knighted in recognition of his creation of the
'World Wide Web'. |
