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History of Computing: fun facts and quiz
The essentials in 7 ideas, with fun facts, an illustrated story and a quiz to see how much you know.
The essentials
Counting Machines
People have built calculating tools for thousands of years, from the abacus to Blaise Pascal’s mechanical calculator of 1642.
Key fact
The abacus is still used in some places today.
Babbage’s Engines
In the 1800s, Charles Babbage designed mechanical computers. His Difference Engine No. 2 was finally built from his plans in 1991, and it worked.
Key fact
The finished machine weighs about 5 tonnes.
Codebreakers
During the Second World War, codebreakers at Bletchley Park, including Alan Turing, cracked German codes. Colossus, built there in 1943–44, was one of the first electronic computers.
Key fact
Bletchley Park’s work stayed secret for decades.
Room-Sized Computers
ENIAC, finished in 1945, filled a room, weighed about 27 tonnes and used around 18,000 vacuum tubes. A cheap calculator today is more powerful.
Key fact
Six women were ENIAC’s first programmers.
The Microchip
The integrated circuit, invented in 1958–59, put many transistors on one chip. In 1971, Intel’s 4004 fitted a whole processor on a single chip.
Key fact
The Intel 4004 had about 2,300 transistors.
Personal Computers
In the late 1970s and 1980s, computers came home: the Apple II (1977), the IBM PC (1981) and the Commodore 64 (1982), one of the best-selling ever.
Key fact
Apple was founded in 1976 by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne.
Computers in Your Pocket
The first smartphones mixed phones with computers in the 1990s. Today’s phones have millions of times the computing power of the computer that guided Apollo 11.
Key fact
The Apollo Guidance Computer had about 4 KB of working memory.
Fun facts
The Antikythera mechanism, a Greek device of bronze gears over 2,000 years old, could predict eclipses.
Babbage also designed a printer for his engine. The Science Museum finished building it in 2000.
Bletchley Park found some of its codebreakers through a newspaper crossword competition.
Programming ENIAC meant rewiring it by hand with cables and switches, which could take days.
Jack Kilby and Robert Noyce invented the microchip independently, just months apart.
The Apple I was sold as a bare circuit board: buyers added their own case, keyboard and screen.
The Apollo Guidance Computer’s memory was woven by hand from copper wire.
Story: The Women Nobody Introduced
The Women Nobody Introduced
February 1946. ENIAC is shown to the press and dazzles the world. Six young women had programmed it, by hand, with cables and switches.
At the launch they weren’t introduced, and they weren’t invited to the celebration dinner. For decades, their photos went unexplained.
In the 1980s, a student asked who they were and was told: models posing by the machine. Her research finally won them their credit.
True or false?
Tap your answer to see if you got it, and why.
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Question 1 of 10
Pascal built a mechanical calculator in the 1600s.
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True. In 1642, as a teenager, to help his father with taxes.
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Question 2 of 10
A Babbage engine was built from his plans in 1991.
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True. By the Science Museum in London.
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Question 3 of 10
Colossus was built to help break codes.
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True. German high-command messages.
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Question 4 of 10
Early computers could fill a whole room.
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True. ENIAC filled a large room.
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Question 5 of 10
The Intel 4004 was an early single-chip processor.
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True. Launched in 1971.
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Question 6 of 10
The IBM PC launched in 1981.
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True. It set the standard for PCs.
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Question 7 of 10
Modern phones far outpower the Apollo guidance computer.
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True. By millions of times.
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Question 8 of 10
The abacus was invented in the 20th century.
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False. It’s thousands of years old.
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Question 9 of 10
Babbage’s engines ran on electricity.
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False. They were purely mechanical, turned by a crank.
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Question 10 of 10
Bletchley Park’s work was made public right after the war.
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False. It stayed secret until the 1970s.
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KnowSoda learns what you know and brings back what you’re about to forget. History of Computing has 6 more ideas at the Advanced and Expert levels.
Sources
- Computer History Museum — Timeline of computer history
- Science Museum (London) — Babbage’s Difference Engine No. 2
- Bletchley Park — Colossus and the codebreakers
- NASA — The Apollo Guidance Computer
- Intel — The 4004 microprocessor
- U.S. Census Bureau — Herman Hollerith and the 1890 census
- NASA — Katherine Johnson biography
- Oak Ridge National Laboratory — Frontier supercomputer
