From the history of computers

The introduction of agriculture revolutionized ancient man’s social, economic, and cultural potential. This was the first great step in the evolution of civilization. The more recent Industrial Revolution, vastly increasing man’s productive capabilities, was the next great step and brought forth our present highly mechanized economic and interdependent social civilization.

Nowadays we have another new kind of revolution, based on machines that greatly increase man’s thinking capabilities of planning, analyzing, computing, and controlling. Hundreds of millions of computers are already in daily use penetrating almost all spheres of our modern society, from nuclear energy production and missile design to the processing of bank checks and medical diagnoses.

The development of mechanical calculating machines made the digital computers necessary. An ordinary arithmometer and a desk key calculator have given rise to electronic digital computers. Digital computers came into being in the first half of the 17^th century. Many outstanding Russian and foreign mathematicians of that time created mechanical calculating devices.

The famous Russian scientist M.V. Lomonosov compiled a lot of calculating tables and several computing devices concerning different fields of science and engineering.

In 1874 the Russian engineer V.T. Odner invented a special counter wheel¹ named after him the Odner’s wheel, which is used in modern arithmometers and calculators.

P.L. Chebyshev, academician, made a valuable contribution to the field of computing machines. He is known² to have many good ideas in mathematics, some of which have been named after him. For example, the Chebyshev’s polynomials play a unique role in the field of orthogonal functions. In 1878 he constructed an original computing machine, which was exhibited in Paris. In 1882 P.L. Chebyshev invented an arithmometer performing automatically multiplication and division. The automation principle put into this computing machine is still widely used all over the world for developing modern computers.

In 1884 Russia began manufacturing computing machines. During World War I the output of computing machines was stopped but soon it continued.

At the end of the 1930s computing engineering began the new era. There appeared computers operating at high speed. The rapid advance of computers resulted from the success achieved by electronics. There appeared a possibility to solve complex mathematical problems within an unusually short time. Modern engineering enables to do the amount of calculations and researches within a very short period of time, which would have required years of laborious work of large groups of people before³.

The first electronic digital computer was developed in Russia under the supervision of S.A. Lebedev in 1950. Then, in 1953 BESM (High-Speed Electronic Computer) was designed by the Academy of Sciences. This machine could perform about 250 million operations. A human being could do this work during 300 years of continuous labour.

BESM was followed by a number of large-, medium-, and small-size general and special purpose computers⁴. It was the first generation of computers constructed on electronic tubes.

The second-generation computers were solid-state large-powered machines.

Computers made on integrated circuits containing hundreds of thousands of active electronic devices in tiny elements are of the third and fourth generations.

Computers of the fifth generation contain high-level user interfaces based on VLSI and SLSI⁵, optical fibers, videodisks, and artificial intelligence⁶ approaches for interaction via natural languages, including speech input.

A major advance in the development of computer technologies was the creation of microprocessors and microcomputers. These tiny computer devices are able to control complex operations.

So we see that the significance of the electronic computers invention can be compared with the invention of the steam engine at the end of the 18^th century and the utilization of atomic energy.

(3 470 t.un.)

NOTES: ¹a special counter wheel – специальное счетное колесо

² He is known to…. – известно, что он …..

³ which would require years of laborious work of large groups of people before – которые потребовали бы раньше годы трудоемкой работы большой группы людей

⁴ general and special purpose computers – универсальные и специализированные компьютеры

⁵ VLSI (Very Large-Scale Integration) – интеграция очень высокого уровня, SLSI (Super Large-Scale Integration) – интеграция сверх высокого уровня

⁶ artificial intelligence - искусственный интеллект

 

COMPUTER AS A CONCEPT

In the developed world of the 20^th century, man lives surrounded by a bewildering variety of machines on which his way of life and even life itself depends. These machines can be simple or complex, minute or enormous. Some, like a sewing machine, are for specific applications while other, like electric drill, can be used for a variety of purposes. Some machines, though designed for a specific purpose, are components in many different machines; for instance, the electric motor gives the electric drill its flexibility. This is because the purpose of the motor – to provide power – is fundamental in many applications.

Another fundamental aspect of twentieth-century life is the vast amount and variety of information that surrounds man from media such as the telephone and radio. This has transformed everyday life as much as engines and motors. There are many machines developed to handle the information, for example television cameras to record pictures, transmitters to send these pictures to television receivers in people’s homes.

The ease of using machines also varies and is not always related to their complexity. For example, some, like refrigerators, can work untended, and little skill or training is required to use a television set or a tin-opener; whereas considerable aptitude, instruction and practice is needed to fly an airplane or use a potter’s wheel. The amount of skill and training required might depend on the circumstances of use – driving a motorcar on a country road is a skill relatively easily acquired compared to driving a racing car on a grand prix circuit. Knowledge of the principles behind the operation of a machine may be useful. It is possible to drive a car without knowing anything about what happens under the bonnet, although one can probably drive better for knowing something about mechanics.

Computers are machines, which handle information, and they are based on relatively simple principles. Knowledge of these principles helps one to understand computers and make better use of them.

Computers which deal with numerical information can be divided into three classes: (1) digital, in which the representation of numbers and the calculations on them are performed by counting processes (e.g. by counting teeth on gear wheels or counting electrical impulses); (2) analogue, in which the representation of numbers and the calculations on them are performed my measuring processes (e.g. in electronic computers by measuring voltages); and (3) hybrid, in which both kinds of process are used. Nowadays the word computer, unless qualified, normally means ‘electronic digital computer’; ‘electronic’ because in most computers electronic processes have replaced all others because of their speed, reliability and cheapness, “digital” because the exactness of digital processes implies a greater potential for accuracy.

(2430 t.un.)

 

THE INTERNET

The Internet, a global computer network that embraces millions of users all over the world, began in the US in 1969 as a military experiment. It was designed to survive a nuclear war. Information sent over the Internet takes the shortest path available from one computer to another. Because of this, any two computers on the Internet will be able to stay in touch with each other as long as there is a single route between them.

Most of the Internet host computers (more than 50%) are in the US, while the rest are located in more than 100 other countries. Although the number of host computers can be counted fairly accurately, nobody knows exactly how many people use the Internet, there are millions, and their number is growing.

The most popular Internet service is e-mail. Most of the people, who have access to the Internet, use the network only for sending and receiving e-mail messages. However, other popular services are available on the Internet: reading USENET News, using the World-Wide Web, telnet, FTP, and Gopher.

In many developing countries the Internet may provide businessmen with a reliable alternative to the expensive and unreliable telecommunication systems of these countries. Commercial users can communicate over the Internet with the rest of the world and can do it very cheaply. When they send e-mail messages, they only have to pay the phones calls to their local service providers, not for calls across their countries or around the world. But who actually pays for sending e-mail messages over the Internet long distances, around the world? The answer is very simple: a used pays his/her service provider a monthly or hourly fee. Part of this fee goes towards its cost to connect to a larger service provider. And part of the fee got by the larger provider goes to cover its cost of running worldwide network of wires and wireless stations.

But saving money is only the first step. If people see that they can make money from the Internet, commercial use of this network will drastically increase. For example, some western architecture companies and garment centers already transmit their basic designs and concepts over the Internet into China, where they are reworked and refined by skilled – but inexpensive – Chinese computer-aided-design specialists.

However, some problems remain. The most important is security. When you send an e-mail message to somebody, this message can travel through many different networks and computers. The data is constantly being directed towards its destination by special computers called routers. Because of this, it is possible to get into any of computers along the route, intercept and even change the data being sent over the Internet. In spite of the fact that there are many strong encoding programs available, nearly all the information being sent over the Internet is transmitted without any form of encoding, i.e. “in the clear”. But when it becomes necessary to send important information over the network, these encoding programs may be useful. Some American banks and companies even conduct transactions over the Internet. However, there are still both commercial and technical problems, which will take time to be resolved.

(2680 t.un.)