History of computing hardware

1. Computing hardware evolved from machines that needed separate manual action to perform each arithmetic operation, to punched card machines, and then to stored-program computers. The history of stored-program computers relates first to computer architecture, that is, the organization of the units to perform input and output, to store data and to operate as an integrated mechanism.

2. The Z3 by inventor Konrad Zuse from 1941 is regarded as the first working programmable, fully automatic modern computing machine. Thus, Zuse is often regarded as the inventor of the computer.

3. Before the development of the general-purpose computer, most calculations were done by humans. Mechanical tools to help humans with digital calculations were then called "calculating machines", by proprietary names, or even as they are now, calculators. It was those humans who used the machines who were then called computers. Aside from written numerals, the first aids to computation were purely mechanical devices which required the operator to set up the initial values of an elementary arithmetic operation, then manipulate the device to obtain the result. A sophisticated (and comparatively recent) example is the slide rule, in which numbers are represented as lengths on a logarithmic scale and computation is performed by setting a cursor and aligning sliding scales, thus adding those lengths. Numbers could be represented in a continuous "analog" form, for instance a voltage or some other physical property was set to be proportional to the number. Analog computers, like those designed and built by Vannevar Bush before World War II were of this type. Numbers could be represented in the form of digits, automatically manipulated by a mechanical mechanism. Although this last approach required more complex mechanisms in many cases, it made for greater precision of results.

II. Определите, являются ли утверждения:

А) истинными

B) ложными

C) в тексте нет информации

1) Vannevar Bush invented and designed not only analog computers.

2) Before the development of the general-purpose computer, most calculations were done by robots.

3) Zuse is often regarded as the inventor of the computer.

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