DEFINITION, THE HISTORY OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM
A computer system is a set of electro-mechanical devices that work together to form a connection system to perform electronic data processing (EDP) using software. It can manipulate and store data for user retrieval. It has the ability to manipulate data for meaningful information. This data can also be stored for further use or further manipulation. It differs from other processing machines such as paper punches, calculators, etc., because they also store instructions that will direct the machine to carry out the steps step by step.
Features COMPUTERS
There are certain qualities possessed by a computer that tend to make it useful for other data processing tools. Some of which usefully include;
High Speed: Computers are electronic machines and as such operate at the speed of electricity. This makes the computer so fast in operation that in seconds, the computer can do things that would take a person days to complete.
Accuracy: Computers do not fail to the extent that they are programmed accurately and are not faulty in their composition. Because computers can operate error-free, they can be trusted to produce accurate results, which is very vital to the user.
Reliability: As they are accurate, computers are reliable and consistent in the information produced by it. Given the same program and the same data, the result produced should always be the same. As a result, computer devices such as microprocessors are being introduced into home appliances and automobiles to increase their durability and reliability. This does not mean that the computer cannot be destroyed. When the computer crashes, it is no longer operational and is said to be down. The amount of time a computer spends in an unbootable state is referred to as down time.
Versatility: Computers are versatile. They can be used in many fields. Some of the areas in which computers can be used include payroll, exam marking, accounting, military, teaching and learning, design and manufacturing, hospitality, airline seat reservation, etc.
Mass Storage Capacity: Computers can store large amounts of data over long periods of time.
Precision: Can represent data, especially numerical quantities, to any (reasonable) degree of magnitude desired. This quality is very useful in scientific and engineering applications.
Security: Because data and information are stored in computer systems in machine-readable forms, they are protected to some extent by those who have access to the computer through the use of a password or other form of identification. So we can say that the computer provides a measure of security for the data and information stored in it.
HISTORY OF THE COMPUTER
computer history is actually as old as human history. The first system of computing was counting, adding other arithmetic operations that were done with the help of the human body, Human parts such as enemies and fingers counted while the eyes acted like a modern computer monitor. The human brain acts as a raw data processor. Other things used were the drawing of lines, wood, stones, etc
“Who invented the computer?” It is not a question with a simple answer. The correct answer is that many inventors have contributed to the history of computers and that a computer is a complex machine made up of many parts, each of which can be may be considered a separate finding. No one person in the invention of computers can be trusted, but several names stand proud in the crowd.
The abacus was said to have originated in China in the 7th century B.C. The abacus is made of iron balls. The abacus is used for addition and subtraction by various manipulations.
ADDITION MACHINE
The first true adding machine was invented in 1642 by Blasio Pascal Gallo. At the time he was born at nineteen he was eager to reduce the numerical work which was involved in his father’s work. In the Paschal Apparatus, the added numbers were entered into the clocks, and the result was read from the positions of the clocks.
Between 1663 and 1666, Sir Samuel Morland in England, probably quite independently of Pascal, invented three calculating machines. The first of which was used for adding and subtracting pounds, solids, pennies, and quarters. Morland’s other machines were not computing machines in the actual sense, but machines that provided access to pre-calculated tables.
In 1671, the great German philosopher Gottfried Leibniz invented a calculator in which the year slipped to place a grid with a variable number of teeth on the drip funnel. This program made multiplication and division easier.
CHARLES BABAGE (1791-1871)
The first attempt to design a computer distinct from the hand made calculator was made by an Englishman, Charles Babbage. Charles Babbage was born in Devonshire in 1792 and educated at Trinity College, Cambridge. The 19th century was the time when most astronomical and navigational charts were made in astronomical charts and Babbage, along with others, managed to devise some methods of calculating charts quickly and accurately. Babbage developed his so-called Difference Engine for this purpose. The machine was started in 1823 under the promise of government funds, and was never completed because Babbage’s idea continued to develop beyond the original concept and he began work on his second invention, which he later referred to as the Analytical Engine. Parts of the difference machine were made: and one section can be seen in the Science Museum in South Kensington, England.
Babbage’s next invention, the Analytical Engine, was close to the concept of the modern computer. It differed from the Advanced Studies at Princeton by John von Neumann and his supporters, Herman Goldstine and Arthur W. Burks, all of whom had earlier, with the ENIAC (Electronic Integrator and Numerical Computation) project, the first electronic digital computer. In historical reports, they established a design that incorporated most of the essential systems found in modern day machines. Reports included the design of a machine called EDVAC (Electronic Discrete Variable Computer). They developed the idea of software storage, and instead supplied software from the input device that was needed. The program was stored inside the machine in the same form as the data, except for the context in which it was encountered. This would allow one part of the program to perform arithmetic operations and thereby change another part of the program, which has the ability to distinguish a real computer from a calculator. After Neumann’s report, several computers were designed in the United and elsewhere, the first of which was a prototype machine at Manchester in 1948 . Later, companies like IBM, Remington Rand Corporation, ICL and many others joined in producing it in commercial quantities.
Babbage worked on his Analytical Engine from about 1830 until his death, but sadly it was never finished. It is often said that Babbage was a hundred years ahead of his time and that the technology of the day was inadequate. This reflects the fact that in 1834, two Swedish engineers named George and Edward Schertz built a small variation of the Engine described by Babbage. Further supporting this theory was the fact that, in 1876, five years after Babbage’s death, an obscure inventor named George Banard Grant showed a complete difference in his invention of a hundred percent machine in Philadelphia. The concession stand was 8 feet wide, 5 feet long, and contained over 15,000 moving parts. The point is that although Babbage’s Analytical Engine was intellectually far more sophisticated than his Difference Engine, constructing the Analytical Engine would not have been beyond the technology of the day.
