jan 18, 1822 - Charles Babbage: Analytic Engine

Description:

By 1834, Cambridge mathematics professor Charles Babbage designed his Analytical Engine, the first general purpose computer, which used punch cards for input and output. This machine also lacked financing and was never built.

1. The Analytical Engine was this design that the basic framework of the computers of today are based on.

2. The logical structure of the Analytical Engine was essentially the same as that which has dominated computer design in the electronic era.

3. Despite this groundwork, Babbage's work fell into historical obscurity, and the Analytical Engine was unknown to builders of electro-mechanical and electronic computing machines in the 1930s and 1940s when they began their work, resulting in the need to re-invent many of the architectural innovations Babbage had proposed.

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