I have been fortunate enough to persuade several people whose experience in the field is far greater than mine to contribute to the book, which contains, I believe, an account written by the designer of every machine which was being built in England in 1951 (with two exceptions), and essays by several economists, statisticians, engineers, physicists and mathematicians.
I decided to concentrate on work which is now being done in this country; it was more convenient to do so; far more work has
been done over here than most people realize, and several excellent books describe contemporary developments in America.
An edition of Faster than thought
(1953)
Faster than thought
a symposium on digital computing machines.
by B. V. Bowden
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Book Details
Table of Contents
Foreword. v
Preface. vii
List of Contributors. xv
Contents. xvii
List of Plates. xix
PART ONE: The History and Theory of Computing Machines.
1. A Brief History of Computation. 3
2. The Circuit Components of Digital Computers. 32
3. The Organization of a Typical Machine. 67
4. The Construction, Performance and Maintenance of Digital Computers. 78
5. Programming for High-speed Digital Calculating Machines. 101
PART TWO: Electronic Computing Machines in Britain and America.
6. The University of Manchester Computing Machine. 117
7. Calculating Machine Development at Cambridge. 130
8. Automatic Computation at the National Physical Laboratory. 135
9. The Harwell Electronic Digital Computer. 140
10. The Telecommunications Research Establishment Parallel Electronic Digital Computer. 144
11. The Imperial College Computing Engine. 161
12. The Royal Aircraft Establishment Sequence-controlled Calculator. 165
13. Calculating Machines at the Birkbeck College Computation Laboratory. 170
14. Computers in America. 173
PART THREE: Applications of Electronic Computing Machines.
15. Machines for the Solution of Logical Problems. 181
16. Special-purpose Automatic Computers. 199
17. Digital Computation and the Crystallographer. 203
18. The Use of High-speed Computing Machines in Meteorology. 210
19. An Application to Ballistics. 216
20. Digital Computers and the Engineer. 223
21. Machines in Government Calculations. 234
22. The Application of Digital Computers to Business and Commerce. 246
23. Electronic Machines and Economics. 272
24. Problems of Dynamical Astronomy. 282
25. Digital Computers Applied to Games. 286
26. Thought and Machine Processes. 311
Appendix 1. Sketch of the Analytical Engine invented by Charles Babbage, Esq. by L.F. Menabrea, translated and with notes by Ada Lovelace. 341
Appendix 2. Extracts from the Lovelace Papers. 409
Glossary. 411
Index. 415
Edition Notes
Includes bibliographical references.
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Excerpts
Page xi,
added by Paulscrawl.
Very well written survey of early computing in Britain, with stellar contributors including Alan Turing and almost all the others present at the creation
We owe our best account of Babbage's "Engines" to the Countess of Lovelace, who was a mathematician of great competence and one of the very few people who understood what Babbage was trying to do. Her ideas are so modern that they have become of great topical interest once again, and since her paper has long been out of print (it appeared more than a hundred years ago) it has been reproduced as an appendix to this book.
Page xi,
added by Paulscrawl.
Appendix 1, pages 341-408, contain the first modern reprint and the cleanest freely available legal copy I've found, reprinted directly from pages 666-731 of "Taylor's Scientific Memoirs", Vol. III, of Ada Lovelace's seminal work: Sketch of the Analytical Engine invented by Charles Babbage, Esq. By L. F.Menabrea, of Turin, Officer of the Military Engineers. [From the Bibliotheque Universelle de Geneve, No. 82. October, 1842]
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