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ENIAC in Action: Making and Remaking the Modern Computer
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ENIAC in Action: Making and Remaking the Modern Computer
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Overview
Conceived in 1943, completed in 1945, and decommissioned in 1955, ENIAC (the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer) was the first general-purpose programmable electronic computer. But ENIAC was more than just a milestone on the road to the modern computer. During its decade of operational life, ENIAC calculated sines and cosines and tested for statistical outliers, plotted the trajectories of bombs and shells, and ran the first numerical weather simulations. ENIAC in Action tells the whole story for the first time, from ENIAC's design, construction, testing, and use to its afterlife as part of computing folklore. It highlights the complex relationship of ENIAC and its designers to the revolutionary approaches to computer architecture and coding first documented by John von Neumann in 1945.
Within this broad sweep, the authors emphasize the crucial but previously neglected years of 1947 to 1948, when ENIAC was reconfigured to run what the authors claim was the first modern computer program to be executed: a simulation of atomic fission for Los Alamos researchers. The authors view ENIAC from diverse perspectives—as a machine of war, as the “first computer,” as a material artifact constantly remade by its users, and as a subject of (contradictory) historical narratives. They integrate the history of the machine and its applications, describing the mathematicians, scientists, and engineers who proposed and designed ENIAC as well as the men—and particularly the women who—built, programmed, and operated it.
Product Details
ISBN-13: | 9780262334433 |
---|---|
Publisher: | MIT Press |
Publication date: | 06/24/2016 |
Series: | History of Computing |
Sold by: | Penguin Random House Publisher Services |
Format: | eBook |
Pages: | 366 |
File size: | 6 MB |
Age Range: | 18 Years |
About the Author
Mark Priestley is an independent researcher.
Crispin Rope is an independent researcher.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ix
List of Recurring Characters xi
Archival Collections Used xv
Introduction 1
1 Imagining ENIAC 17
2 Structuring ENIAC 35
3 Bringing ENIAC to Life 59
4 Putting ENIAC to Work 85
5 ENIAC Arrives at the Ballistic Research Lab 111
6 EDVAC and the First Draft 129
7 Converting ENIAC 153
8 ENIAC Goes to Monte Carlo 173
9 ENIAC Tries Its Luck 193
10 ENIAC Settles Down to Work 207
11 ENIAC and Its Contemporaries Meet the "Stored Program Concept" 231
12 Remembering ENIAC 259
Conclusion 275
Notes 289
Name Index 339
Subject Index 343
What People are Saying About This
I have a shelf full of books about the ENIAC, the electronic computer whose completion in 1945 heralded the birth of the Information Age. But until now, none have captured the many facets of that machine and its place in history. Basing their book on a wealth of archival research, Haigh, Priestley, and Rope for the first time tell this story in its fullest measure.
ENIAC in Action delivers a breathtakingly original, approachable, and at times even funny reinterpretation of the dawn of computing. More than the story of one hugely important machine, told from technical, institutional, and personal perspectives, it illuminates the invention of the modern computer, the development of programming, the transformation of scientific practice around new technology, and the transition from the mathematical technology of World War II to the simulations culture of the early Cold War.
This book should be read by anyone who wants to understand the initial evolution of our modern abstraction of what a computer is. The authors weave a convincing account of how ENIAC's architecture was originally developed and then continued to evolve. They combine a careful reading of the documentation and lab notebooks generated during ENIAC's development with a deep understanding of the architectural issues behind competing possible implementations.
Mitch Marcus, RCA Professor of Artificial Intelligence, Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Pennsylvania
I have a shelf full of books about the ENIAC, the electronic computer whose completion in 1945 heralded the birth of the Information Age. But until now, none have captured the many facets of that machine and its place in history. Basing their book on a wealth of archival research, Haigh, Priestley, and Rope for the first time tell this story in its fullest measure.
Paul E. Ceruzzi, Chairman, Division of Space History, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian InstitutionENIAC in Action delivers a breathtakingly original, approachable, and at times even funny reinterpretation of the dawn of computing. More than the story of one hugely important machine, told from technical, institutional, and personal perspectives, it illuminates the invention of the modern computer, the development of programming, the transformation of scientific practice around new technology, and the transition from the mathematical technology of World War II to the simulations culture of the early Cold War.
Joseph November, Associate Professor of History, University of South CarolinaThis book should be read by anyone who wants to understand the initial evolution of our modern abstraction of what a computer is. The authors weave a convincing account of how ENIAC's architecture was originally developed and then continued to evolve. They combine a careful reading of the documentation and lab notebooks generated during ENIAC's development with a deep understanding of the architectural issues behind competing possible implementations.
Mitch Marcus, RCA Professor of Artificial Intelligence, Department of Computer and Information Science, University of PennsylvaniaThis book should be read by anyone who wants to understand the initial evolution of our modern abstraction of what a computer is. The authors weave a convincing account of how ENIAC's architecture was originally developed and then continued to evolve. They combine a careful reading of the documentation and lab notebooks generated during ENIAC's development with a deep understanding of the architectural issues behind competing possible implementations.