History

Question 1

What is Church’s thesis?

Answer 1

A computer is a machine that can simulate any other machine given enough memory.

Question 2

Name some of the early computational devices.

Answer 2

Ishango bone, Abacus, odometry cart, barrel organs, pascal’s mechanism, punch card machine, analytical / difference engine.

Question 3

When did Babbage invent the difference and analytical engines?

Answer 3

Difference engine - 1822 // Analytical engine 1830s

Question 4

What architecture was the analytical engine?

Answer 4

Harvard

Question 5

Does the analytical engine satisfy Church’s thesis? Why?

Answer 5

No, because it can read but not write.

Question 6

IBM created what device in the 1890s?

Answer 6

Punch card tabulator.

Question 7

What was the 1890 IBM device used for?

Answer 7

American census of 1890 and WW2 code breaking.

Question 8

What machine did Germany develop in 1941?

Answer 8

Konrad Zeus

Question 9

What machine did Britain develop in 1944?

Answer 9

Colossus machine

Question 10

Does the Colossus machine satisfy Church’s thesis? Why?

Answer 10

Yes, because it can read and it is partially programmable

Question 11

What did America develop in 1946?

Answer 11

ENIAC.

Question 12

Does the ENIAC satisfy Church’s thesis?

Answer 12

Yes.

Question 13

How many valves and how fast was ENIAC?

Answer 13

17000 valves, and 5000kHz

Question 14

What did Britain develop in 1948?

Answer 14

The Manchester baby

Question 15

Who developed the Manchester baby?

Answer 15

Williams, Kilburn, Toothill

Question 16

What architecture was the Manchester baby? Why?

Answer 16

Vonn Neumann, because it stored its programs and data in the RAM.

Question 17

Does the Manchester baby satisfy Church’s thesis?

Answer 17

Yes

Question 18

What type of computing hardware was introduced in the 1960s?

Answer 18

Transistor based computing

Question 19

Name 3 microprocessors from the 1970s

Answer 19

Intel 4004, intel 8080, intel 8086

Question 20

What type of computers were developed in the 1980s?

Answer 20

16bit computers

Question 21

What is Moore’s law?

Answer 21

The number of transistors per square inch will double every 18 months.

Question 22

What is the difference between Harvard and Vonn Neumann architecture?

Answer 22

Harvard has two memory locations for the data and programs, whereas, Vonn Neumann has just one with both stored together.