Computer Colossus Patterns Commentary

Charles Babbage, Alan Turing, John von Neumann computer science

Computer

• If it had been built,
• Babbage’s Analytical Engine,
• a mechanical computer,
• would have been programmed
• using punched cards.
• Babbage continued to improve the design
• until he died in 1871.
• In 1936, Alan Turing invented
• a hypothetical device,
• a universal logical computing model
• that could model anything computable,
• even itself.
• And by 1948, Von Neumann established
• the basis of modern computer architecture
• and designed the instruction set
• for ENIAC, which some say was the first
• programmable general-purpose computer.
• All efforts have steadily ensured that
• our expectations have exceeded
• the speed of our machines.

Colossus

• During World War II,
• Turing and von Neumann contributed
• to the British effort to decode
• messages from the German High Command.
• The Colossus machines, the first
• programmable electronic digital computers,
• were built to help decipher streams
• from the German’s cipher attachments
• for the Lorenz teleprinters.
• The Colossus machines were destroyed
• and their existence kept secret,
• but they shortened the war
• and gave vitality to British computer science
• lasting many years after.

Patterns

• A stick with notches
• can simulate a drumming pattern.
• Stencils can repeat designs.
• Punched holes in a paper roll
• can control a loom.
• Pins in a cylinder can match a key;
• pins on a drum can play a tune.
• Why waste time repeating yourself?
• If you say “Hello,” I’ll just say “No.”