webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) (06/28/88)
In article <1496@its63b.ed.ac.uk>, bct@its63b.ed.ac.uk (B Tompsett) writes: > In article <Jun.20.04.49.43.1988.3576@porthos.rutgers.edu> webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) writes: > >[....] Also, it was only plugboard-programmed until > >1948 at which time it became the first stored-program computer (although > >the store was read-only). Prior to 1948, it was a parallel computer [....] > Correction: the Manchester Mark I was the first stored-program computer. It > first ran on 21st June 1948. This week marks the 40th aniversary ... PERHAPS. So far, I have found three references relevant to this question. The primary reference is the chronology of the stored-program concept presented in Metropolis and Worlton's A Trilogy on Errors in the History of Computing [Proc. USA-Japan Conf 1st,, Tokyo, Oct 3-7,1972.] Here, the chronology is laid out as: Manual Program Control: Bell Labs's Complex Calculator (1940) Automatic Program Control: Zuse Z3 (1941) and Harvard Mark I (1944) Internal Program Control: ENIAC (1946) Storage Program Control: ENIAC (modified-1948) Read-Write Storage Program Control Concept: EDVAC 1945 Read-Write Storage Program Control Implemented: BINAC and EDSAC (1949) Two questions are raised here: 1) Why no mention of the Manchester Mark I and 2) just when in 1948 did the ENIAC get converted. On the second point, I have so far seen no references to an exact day in 1948 when the ``first ENIAC'' program was run. Note that the ENIAC was already a working computer when it was converted and it is claimed that its design specifically invited this conversion (i.e., it was an ``easy'' upgrade). So it may be that the ENIAC ran a stored program before or after tha Manchester Mark I did in 1948. However, in the listings on the other points in history, this article does not seem one to cut such a fine distinction, i.e., I would have expected to simply see both machines listed for 1948. Their primary source of information on the conversion of the ENIAC was an interview with R. F. Clippinger that was part of the Smithsonian AFIPS History Project with the reference ``to be published,'' which I have not seen. One hypothesis is that the authors who were trying to cut thru all the errors surrounding the history of the stored program idea were themselves unaware of the Manchester Mark I. However, their bibliography shows that they had reference to the Earl of Halsbury's Ten Years of Computer Development (which appeared in the first volume of Computer Journal in 1959 on pages 153 thru 159) as well as personal correspondence with the Earl. Also, this paper has an extensive section on the awareness of the work of Babbage among the early computer designers with many references to the history of computing in Britain. There is also specific mention of Williams and Kilburn at Manchester as being a group working independent of the ENIAC-EDVAC stimulus. Part of the mystery seems to clear when we refer directly to the Earl's article. He is the only one of these three authors to actually define what he means by ``modern computer.'' He regards it as involving: 1) all-electronic data processing; 2) stored program; and 3) automatic peripheral equipment. This causes him to cite Wilke's EDSAC at Cambridge May 1949 as the ancestor of all such equipment. He mentions that the ENIAC had insufficient memory to tackle many problems as the reason for discounting it. He indicates that the Manchester Mark I is being discounted because of lack of ``automatic peripheral equipment.'' He then goes on to say that if you discount the 3rd criteria, then you would view the Manchester Mark I as the first and he cites a ``prototype'' of the Manchester Mark I in the ``Spring'' of 1948 that could ``only subtract and had only manual input.'' The third reference is S. H. Lavington's Computer Development at Manchester University which appeared in A History of Computing in the Twentieth Century (edited by N. Metropolis, J. Howlett, and Gian-Carlo Rota, Academic Press, 1980, 433-445). This article distinguishes to two machines, the University Mark I and the Ferranti Mark I, indicating that the first was a ``prototype'' (the Ferranti Mark I was referred to by Turing as the Mark II). The order code for the Ferranti MARK I was based on the order code for the University Mark I ``as it existed in October 1949.'' Reference is also made to ``a series of University prototypes completed during the period June 1948 and October 1949.'' Reference is also made to a ``52-minute program on 21 June 1948'' that was run. So as to the claims of the Manchester Mark I versus the Clippinger-modified ENIAC, there are a number of points unclear: 1) precise date for the ENIAC modification 2) precise capabilities of the June 48 Manchester Mark I 3) just what the heck is a ``computer'' anyway? ------ BOB (webber@athos.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!athos.rutgers.edu!webber)
omondi@unc.cs.unc.edu (Amos Omondi) (06/29/88)
In article <Jun.28.09.58.44.1988.6473@porthos.rutgers.edu>, webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) writes: > In article <1496@its63b.ed.ac.uk>, bct@its63b.ed.ac.uk (B Tompsett) writes: > > In article <Jun.20.04.49.43.1988.3576@porthos.rutgers.edu> webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) writes: > > >[....] Also, it was only plugboard-programmed until > > >1948 at which time it became the first stored-program computer (although > > >the store was read-only). Prior to 1948, it was a parallel computer [....] > > Correction: the Manchester Mark I was the first stored-program computer. It > > first ran on 21st June 1948. This week marks the 40th aniversary ... > > PERHAPS. So far, I have found three references relevant to this question. > The primary reference is the chronology of the stored-program concept presented > in Metropolis and Worlton's A Trilogy on Errors in the History of Computing > [Proc. USA-Japan Conf 1st,, Tokyo, Oct 3-7,1972.] Here, the chronology is > laid out as: > Manual Program Control: Bell Labs's Complex Calculator (1940) > Automatic Program Control: Zuse Z3 (1941) and Harvard Mark I (1944) > Internal Program Control: ENIAC (1946) > Storage Program Control: ENIAC (modified-1948) > Read-Write Storage Program Control Concept: EDVAC 1945 > Read-Write Storage Program Control Implemented: BINAC and EDSAC (1949) > > Two questions are raised here: 1) Why no mention of the Manchester Mark I Good question ... > and 2) just when in 1948 did the ENIAC get converted. > > On the second point, I have so far seen no references to an exact day > in 1948 when the ``first ENIAC'' program was run. Note that the ENIAC ^^^ This is probably understandable since someone appears to have remembered these modifications only years after ... > was already a working computer when it was converted and it is claimed > that its design specifically invited this conversion (i.e., it was an > ``easy'' upgrade). So it may be that the ENIAC ran a stored program > before or after tha Manchester Mark I did in 1948. However, in the How is it that neither Burks, Eckert, nor Mauchly, who surely ought to know a thing or two about the ENIAC do not appear to have said anything about these modifications or this 1948 date ? > 1) precise date for the ENIAC modification There is little or no information about this, it seems ... > 2) precise capabilities of the June 48 Manchester Mark I You can find this in two books by Lavington: -- A History of Manchester Computers. -- Early British Computers as well as papers published by williams and Kilburn in 1948 and later ... > Personally, i think more and more dubious claims appear to be made about the ENIAC as time goes on. One of these is to be found in the book edited by Metropolis, et. al: some 34 yrs. after the Williams tube appeared, Eckert suddenly remembered that it had been his invention. I've always wondered why he never said anything while Williams and colleagues patented the idea in Europe and the U.S. (patents later sold to IBM) and Manc. Univ. and NRDC made a bundle from it for years ... BTW: "BIT by BIT: An Illustrated History of Computers" by S. Augarten is a very good read on these historical matters ... ;
webber@aramis.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) (06/30/88)
In article <3255@thorin.cs.unc.edu>, omondi@unc.cs.unc.edu (Amos Omondi) writes: > In article <Jun.28.09.58.44.1988.6473@porthos.rutgers.edu>, webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) writes: < < ... < < On the second point, I have so far seen no references to an exact day < < in 1948 when the ``first ENIAC'' program was run. Note that the ENIAC < ^^^ < This is probably understandable since someone appears to have remembered < these modifications only years after ... Hmmm. I am not sure quite what you mean to be implying there. The modifications were quite ``real.'' For example, there was a report authored by ``Anonymous'' entitled ``Description and Use of the ENIAC Converter Code'' reviewed in 1950 (vol 4, pp. 150-151 of Mathematical Tables and Aids to Computation) -- the report itself, consisting of 23 mimeographed pages, was dated Nov 1949 according to the review. Also of interest was the second meeting of the ACM, which was held in Dec 11 & 12 of 1947. At this meeting, two papers were presented whose titles suggest a relevance to this discussion (alas, I have not seen these papers anywhere): ``General Principles of Coding, with application to the ENIAC'' by J. von Neumann and ``Adaptation of the ENIAC to von Neumann's coding technique'' by R. F. Clippinger. The meeting was held at BRL. [I wonder if they drifted north to the Moore School Library.] < < was already a working computer when it was converted and it is claimed < < that its design specifically invited this conversion (i.e., it was an < < ``easy'' upgrade). So it may be that the ENIAC ran a stored program < < before or after tha Manchester Mark I did in 1948. However, in the < < How is it that neither Burks, Eckert, nor Mauchly, who surely ought to < know a thing or two about the ENIAC do not appear to have said anything < about these modifications or this 1948 date ? Well, for one thing, they seem to not have been directly involved in the modification which was made after the ENIAC had moved to BRL. However, they do figure in the question of who gets credit for what. Basically, I think the easiest way to understand the ENIAC is to view it not as a computer but rather as a computational laboratory. There are many interesting ways it could be ``put together'' to solve a given problem. The system was quite flexible was clearly intended to be modified. However, the designers of this marvelous machine seem to have abandoned this approach to computing before the ENIAC was even finished -- focussing instead on what is now commonly referred to as the ``von Neumann'' architecture. --- BOB (webber@athos.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!athos.rutgers.edu!webber)
omondi@unc.cs.unc.edu (Amos Omondi) (07/02/88)
In article <Jun.30.04.56.23.1988.24272@aramis.rutgers.edu>, webber@aramis.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) writes: > > Hmmm. I am not sure quite what you mean to be implying there. The > modifications were quite ``real.'' For example, there was a report > authored by ``Anonymous'' entitled ``Description and Use of the ENIAC > Converter Code'' reviewed in 1950 (vol 4, pp. 150-151 of Mathematical > Tables and Aids to Computation) -- the report itself, consisting of 23 > mimeographed pages, was dated Nov 1949 according to the review. Just out of curiosity, what precisely were these modifications? The way ENIAC was programmed (setting thousands of switches by hand) makes it hard to imagine that it would have been easy to convert it to a real stored-program machine. > > Also of interest was the second meeting of the ACM, which was held in > Dec 11 & 12 of 1947. At this meeting, two papers were presented > whose titles suggest a relevance to this discussion (alas, I have not > seen these papers anywhere): ``General Principles of Coding, with > application to the ENIAC'' by J. von Neumann and ``Adaptation of the > ENIAC to von Neumann's coding technique'' by R. F. Clippinger. The I don't necessarily see the relevance. I tend to think of "coding" as "hacking" and all i can learn from the titles is that von Neumann had a clever hack for something ... Since Eckert and Mauchly had the stored- program idea before von Neumann came aboard, and i would assume that RFC was sufficiently closely involved to have known that, the titles would say even less about the "modifications" ... > < How is it that neither Burks, Eckert, nor Mauchly, who surely ought to > < know a thing or two about the ENIAC do not appear to have said anything > < about these modifications or this 1948 date ? > > Well, for one thing, they seem to not have been directly involved in > the modification which was made after the ENIAC had moved to BRL. Somehow i find it hard to believe that Eckert and Mauchly lost all interest in ENIAC, notwithstanding the move to BRL and work on the EDVAC. If the big thing about the EDVAC was the stored-program idea (and given that BRL was presumably footing most of the bill for the two machines) then it is unlikely that the change would have gone unnoticed; recall that there was someone (Goldstine) whose job was to act as liason between BRL and UPenn ... and Goldstine could hardly wait to let the world know what a great idea EDVAC and its stored programs was ( ... the business with the preliminary EDVAC report).
webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) (07/02/88)
In article <3298@thorin.cs.unc.edu>, omondi@unc.cs.unc.edu (Amos Omondi) writes: < In article <Jun.30.04.56.23.1988.24272@aramis.rutgers.edu<, webber@aramis.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) writes: < < < < Hmmm. I am not sure quite what you mean to be implying there. The < < modifications were quite ``real.'' For example, there was a report < < authored by ``Anonymous'' entitled ``Description and Use of the ENIAC < < Converter Code'' reviewed in 1950 (vol 4, pp. 150-151 of Mathematical < < Tables and Aids to Computation) -- the report itself, consisting of 23 < < mimeographed pages, was dated Nov 1949 according to the review. < < Just out of curiosity, what precisely were these modifications? The way < ENIAC was programmed (setting thousands of switches by hand) makes it hard < to imagine that it would have been easy to convert it to a real stored-program < machine. The ENIAC as implemented in 1945 was programmed by wiring it up. It also had some function tables that could be set by switches (as well as various other switches). The 1948 modification was to get a switch that would send a pulse down one of 100 distinct lines depending on which two digit code it read. This was used to activate one of 100 different wirings of the ENIAC that were then kept the same from program to program. These ``machine code'' values were read from the function tables. So at this point, you had a read-only program store that you could set by switches (although lost from your quotations, my original message did specify it as a ``read-only stored program implementation.'' < < Also of interest was the second meeting of the ACM, which was held in < < Dec 11 & 12 of 1947. At this meeting, two papers were presented < < whose titles suggest a relevance to this discussion (alas, I have not < < seen these papers anywhere): ``General Principles of Coding, with < < application to the ENIAC'' by J. von Neumann and ``Adaptation of the < < ENIAC to von Neumann's coding technique'' by R. F. Clippinger. The < < I don't necessarily see the relevance. I tend to think of "coding" as < "hacking" and all i can learn from the titles is that von Neumann had < a clever hack for something ... Nope. Von Neumann is clearly talking about general programming methodology and not some specific hack (go down to the math library and take a look at volume 5 of the collected works of Von Neumann and you will see the sorts of things he talks about under phrases like ``coding''). < Since Eckert and Mauchly had the stored- < program idea before von Neumann came aboard, and i would assume that < RFC was sufficiently closely involved to have known that, the titles would < say even less about the "modifications" ... What is at issue is not the stored-program idea (clearly Turing's paper on the Turing machine had that as well as various other people throughout the history of computing), but rather the implementation of this idea using electronics. I forget where, but somewhere I recall reading that either Eckert or Mauchly claimed that Clippinger had independently discovered something that the designers had always intended to leave open as a possibility. However, while the machine was at UPenn, there is no record of anyone trying out machine codes -- the earliest layout of a machine code for an ELECTRONIC computer that I have seen is Goldstine&von Neumann's EDVAC proposal. < Somehow i find it hard to believe that Eckert and Mauchly lost all interest < in ENIAC, notwithstanding the move to BRL and work on the EDVAC. If the Take a look at the Moore School lectures some time [reprinted MIT press 1985; originally given summer 1946.]. Specifically, on page 490: A number of the students attending the special course had come under the impression that the main topic would be the construction and operation of the ENIAC. Up to this point in the course the ENIAC had been mentioned only in passing [1 month + 1 week into the 2 month course], and then only to illustrate the concept of an accumulator. Several students had asked the Moore School staff to include more ENIAC information in the lectures, but, according to Verzuh, they usually recieved the comment ``It is no good, so why talk about it.'' The dissatisfaction reached a climax on August 14, when Verzuh noted: ``During the day an inquiry sheet was passed out to the members of the class. There had been some boisterous denouncements of the manner in which the course was being conducted. As a result of the inquiry, a discussion of the ENIAC is to be included in the next 12 sessions. < big thing about the EDVAC was the stored-program idea (and given that Nope. The big things were: SERIAL (no more parallel confusions); large program store (no more scraping by with 20 registers); and finally putting the program into that writable program store. < BRL was presumably footing most of the bill for the two machines) then < it is unlikely that the change would have gone unnoticed; recall that there < was someone (Goldstine) whose job was to act as liason between BRL and < UPenn ... and Goldstine could hardly wait to let the world know what a < great idea EDVAC and its stored programs was ( ... the business with < the preliminary EDVAC report). I don't recall saying Eckert and Mauchly didn't know about it. Merely that they didn't seem to have been involved in it. At this time they were also breaking their ties with UPenn as well. Both of them left UPenn in early 1946 to form their own company -- two years before the 1948 mods. ---- BOB (webber@athos.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!athos.rutgers.edu!webber)
ceg@edsdrd.UUCP (Carlos Galarce) (07/08/88)
Arthur Burks (University of Michigan) and Alicia Burks have written
a book on work that lead to the ENIAC.
The First Electronic Computer: The Atanasoff Story
The University of Michigan Press
839 Greene Street
Ann Arbor, Mi 48106
(313) 764-4392
About $30.00
From a flier I picked up at a conference:
"... This special purpose digital machine not only proved the
feasibility of electronic computation, but also led
directly to the ENIAC, the first general-purpose electronic
computer, and through its successors to the computers of
today..."
"... In the First Electronic Computer, Alice and Arthur Burks
describe the genesis of Anatosoff's machine, placing in the
context of the technologies from which it grew and the
technology it launched..."
Even though I haven't read this particular book, I have read some
of Arthur Burks' papers on the subject and they are quite interesting.
They deal with patents, corporate maneuvering and litigation in US
Federal Court on the subject of the electronic computer invention.
I am sure that this book should give some insights into early work in
digital computers from a team that was there when things were
happening.
--
Carlos E. Galarce - Electronic Data Systems Research
USENET: ... {rutgers!umix,uunet!edsews}!rel!edsdrd!ceg
USMail: 2107 Crooks Rd.
Troy, Mi 48007-7019