After graduation, Aiken came to Madison, the capital of Wisconsin, and worked for Madison Gas Company. Electric Co) found a job that allowed him to study at the University of Wisconsin at the same time. 1923, graduated from Aiken University with a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering, and was immediately promoted to chief engineer of the company. 1928, he left his former company and went to Westinghouse electric manufacturing company. Three years later, he went to Milwaukee line material company .. 1933. Aiken felt that he had chosen the wrong major in electrical engineering, so he made up his mind to quit his job and go back to school to study physics. At this time, he was 33 years old. Aiken advanced to the University of Chicago, but soon transferred to Harvard University, where he obtained a master's degree in 1937 and a master's degree in 1939.
Aiken's doctoral thesis is entitled "Theory of Space Charge Conduction". The research of this subject requires the calculation of complex nonlinear differential equations, but Aiken has only one hand-operated desktop computer available, and it often takes a lot of time to solve an equation, which leads to the idea of developing an automatic computer. Aiken put forward the first proposal of automatic computer in 1937 on the basis of deeply studying the work of Charles Babbage (1791—1871), the famous document "Proposing Automatic Computer". In this 22-page document printed on both sides, Aiken put forward his design goal, that is, four characteristics of the computer later called Mark I:
Mark 3
1. It can handle both positive and negative numbers.
2. Can solve various transcendental functions, such as trigonometric function, logarithmic function, Bessel function, probability function, etc.
3. Fully automatic. That is to say, once the processing starts, the operation is completely automatic, without human intervention.
4. In the process of calculation, the subsequent calculation depends on the result of the previous calculation.
Aiken had hoped to get financial support from the school to develop his computer, but failed. Fortunately, he was recommended by Professor Ted Brown of Business School and Professor harlow shapley of Astronomy Department, and got in touch with Watson, the boss of IBM. Watson, a visionary, is committed to transforming IBM from a company that only manufactures office equipment into a company that manufactures computers, so he fully supports Aiken's plan and signed an agreement to manufacture Mark I in March 1939. Watson put the company's main technical backbone such as Lake (Clair D.Lake, 1888- 1958), Hamilton (Frank Hamilton, 1898- 1972) and Du Fei (Benjamin Durfee,/Kloc-0).
Lake is a senior engineer at IBM. 19 15 years from the automobile industry to IBM. He is a famous inventor. However, due to the outbreak of World War II, Aiken was enlisted as an instructor at the Naval Mine Warfare School in Yorktown. He can only develop Mark I intermittently. Fortunately, one day, an influential senior naval officer who knew Aiken's situation met Aiken and asked him in surprise why he was here instead of developing Mark I? Aiken replied, didn't you order me to work here? This became a turning point: a few hours later, a new order was issued, appointing Aiken as the head of the naval computing project, and immediately leaving the naval school to work at Harvard University. Later Aiken joked that he was the only computer commander in the world.
The machine is running.
After 5-6 years of cooperation and efforts between Aiken and IBM (including inevitable friction and collision, of course), Mark I was finally completed and put into use in May of 1944. It uses more than 3,000 motor-driven relays, and it is a 5-ton behemoth with a cost as high as 500,000 US dollars (some data even say that it exceeds 6,543.8+0,000 US dollars), of which IBM's investment accounts for 2/3, and the rest 654.38+0/3 is funded by the navy. Its core is 7 1 rotation register (the device that temporarily stores operands in operation is called register, starting with Mark), and each register can store a positive or negative 23-bit number. Data and instructions are input through punch card machine, and output is realized by teletypewriter. The addition speed is 300ms, the multiplication speed is 6 s, and the division speed is11.4s. Of course, it can't be compared with modern computers. Even compared with the world's first electronic computer ENIAC, which was born two years later, it is very backward, but it is actually the world's first automatic digital computer to realize sequence control. IBM named it ASCC, that is, automatic sequence control calculator, which is a major breakthrough in the history of computing technology. In the past, it took four experts three weeks to complete the task, and it only took 19 hours on Mark I, and it was very reliable, working 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, which was incomparable to the original electronic computer.
Mark I is mainly used in the calculation of trajectory and shooting table of the Ship Bureau, and also used in the calculation of atomic bomb in Manhattan Project. In addition, it also serves scientists inside and outside Harvard University. For example, Wassily Leontief, a famous professor of economics at Harvard University, used Mark I to solve various linear equation problems in input-output analysis. 1949, Harvard University Computing Laboratory (1946 Aiken was founded after he officially retired from the navy and returned to Harvard University, and Aiken served as the director until his retirement), that is, the chronicle of Harvard University Computing Laboratory, published 19 mathematical tables, all of which were the achievements of Mark I, especially in the calculation of Bessel function. When American Weekly reported Mark I in June1944+1October 14, it called Mark I a "super brain", saying that it can solve various problems such as physics, mathematics, atomic structure and so on. To put it mildly, it may also solve the problem of human origin.
Mark I did not retire until 1958, and is still carefully preserved in the United States.
Mark I
After Mark I, Aiken successively developed Mark II (1946), Mark III (1950) and Mark IV (1952), but IBM did not continue to support the development of these projects. It was because Watson received a cold reception at the ceremony to celebrate the inauguration of Mark I, and Aiken attributed almost all the credit for Mark I's success in his speech, which made Watson extremely angry and stopped all support for Aiken and Harvard University. Mark Ⅱ was produced for the navy at Dalgren proving ground in Virginia, and its reliability has been strictly tested at the proving ground. According to the records, on June 26th, 1947, 19 guns were fired from the main gun group of the warship. In the earth-shattering gunfire, none of the relays near Mark broke down. The report concluded that the shelling did not cause any interference to the normal operation of the computer, so special protective measures were not needed. Since Markⅲⅲ, Aiken began to use electronic components. Its register consists of electronic tube circuits, and data and instructions are placed on the magnetic drum, with a capacity of 4350 words 16 bits and about 4000 instructions. The user is still the Dalgren proving ground. Aiken's last computer, Mark ⅳ, was developed for the Air Force. A core shift register and a semiconductor diode circuit are added. The table shows the basic data about Mark I to Mark IV. (Form cannot be added)
Howard Hathaway Aiken
While developing Mark computer, Aiken also devoted himself to computer education and training. 1947- 1948 In the academic year, Aiken took the lead in setting up the course of "Organization of Large Digital Computers" at Harvard University, and soon after that, he set up the computer "Numerical Analysis". Thanks to Aiken's efforts, Harvard University became one of the first universities in the world to introduce computer postgraduate courses and award master's and doctor's degrees in computer science. Aiken himself brought out 15 doctoral students and more master students, most of whom became the backbone of the early computer field. Among them are Frederick Phillips Brooks (Jr.) and Kenneth Eugene Iverson (father of APL), winners of Turing Award and Computer Pioneer Award, and Gerrit A.Blaauw, a Dutch scholar who also won the Computer Pioneer Award with 1994. Aiken has also held countless training courses, seminars and academic seminars on computers, from which computer scholars in the United States and other countries have benefited greatly and played an important role in promoting and promoting the development of computing technology. Some critics believe that Aiken's contribution in these aspects is even more remarkable than the Mark computer he developed.
Aiken's works are rare. 195 1 year, he and his colleagues edited and published the book Synthesis of Electronic Computing and Control Circuits, which is the first monograph in this field. However, the 30-volume Yearbook of Computing Laboratories, edited by Aiken and published by Harvard University Press, is an extremely precious treasure left by Aiken, including 3-volume annual reports detailing and describing Mark I—MarkⅳIV IV, 4-volume conference proceedings on large digital computers and switch theory, and 23-volume mathematical tables. In addition, Aiken also submitted a large number of relevant technical reports to the Naval Ship Bureau, Atomic Energy Commission, Air Force, Bell Telephone Laboratory, NSF of the American Natural Science Foundation, American Gas Association and Edison Electric Society, with a total volume of 140, which is amazing in number and richness.
Aiken has won many honors and awards. In addition to the computer pioneer award, IEEE also awarded him the John Award and the Edison Award. Franklin Institute awarded him the John Prize. The navy awarded him the Distinguished Public Service Award, while the Air Force awarded him the Distinguished Citizen Service Medal. His alma mater, the University of Wisconsin, awarded him a certificate of outstanding professional service. The French and Belgian governments also awarded Aiken the highest honorary title or award as a citizen of the country (Knights of the French Legion of Honor and the Royal Belgian Officer Cross). Aiken is an academician of the American Academy of Arts and one of the first members of the High-speed Computer Committee established by NSC of American Research Institute 1946. In addition, he is an honorary consultant or foreign academician of national academic institutions in Spain and Sweden.
Aiken retired from Harvard University on 196 1 and moved to Fort Lauderdale, Florida. He was hired by the University of Miami as a professor of information technology, helped the school to formulate the syllabus of computer science, designed its computing center, and founded his own company called Aiken Industries, mainly engaged in technical consulting. 1March, 973 14, just one week after his 73rd birthday, Aiken died of a heart attack in St. Louis, Missouri.
Professor howard aiken, a late bloomer, re-edited this passage into the catalogue.
We went back to 1939 to 1944, that is, during the Second World War (1939, Hitler occupied Poland and Britain and France declared war on Germany). At this time, electromechanical computers appeared in Harvard University, namely Harvard Mark series computers in howard aiken. Compared with the later ENIAC, these computers are not large computers in the modern sense in terms of architecture, but they have opened the prelude to the computer age.
Howard aiken was born in Hoboken Town, Newark, New Jersey, USA on March 9, 1900. After graduating from high school, he entered the University of Wisconsin. After graduating from college, Aiken worked in Madison Gas Company from 1923 to 1928. From 1928 to 193 1, served as chief engineer in Westinghouse electric and manufacturing company. From 193 1 to 1932, I worked in the line material company. Then 1937 got a master's degree in physics department of Harvard University, and 1939 got a doctorate, which can be said to be a late bloomer.
Howard hathaway aiken is at work.
After staying in school, he served as a lecturer from 1939 to 194 1, an associate professor from194 to 1946, and was promoted to a professor from 1946. From 1947 to 196 1, he served as the director of Harvard computing laboratory. 196 1 year, Aiken left Harvard University and went to Miami University as a professor of information technology, where he worked until 1973. 1March 1973 14 died in St. Louis, Missouri.
Deeply influenced by Babbage
When he was a graduate student in Harvard physics department, he began to plan to build a large computing machine. Aiken put forward his suggestion to the physics department in 1936, but the department ignored the demand for computing machines. Professor Frederick Saunders, the head of the department, told Aiken that Carmelo Lanza, a technician in the laboratory, said that there was a similar computing device stored in the attic of the Science Center. This aroused Aiken's great interest. Lan took him to see the machine, which turned out to be some brass gear parts of an analysis engine unfinished by the British mathematician and philosopher Charles Babbage (1791-1871) more than 65,438 years ago. Aiken immediately realized that he and Babbage had the same idea. Babbage failed to realize his dream because he had no money and material things, and Aiken believed that he would be much luckier and he would have more chances to succeed.
Later, Babbage's grandson gave Aiken these brass parts and a pile of grandfather's books. These treasures occupied a considerable space in Aiken's office. For visitors, Aiken always points to Babbage's books and says, "This is all my computer education, and I have benefited a lot from these books."
Suggestions on computers
Harvard mark I
Aiken is studying the theory of space charge conduction in vacuum tubes. His research needs to solve differential equations, which have no exact solution, so he can only find approximate solutions by numerical methods. The amount of calculation he needed was impossible for a desktop calculator at that time, and it was almost impossible to input a large amount of data manually. After his choice failed, he decided to use the punch card device to input data. In 1937, he wrote another suggestion about huge computing machines. He wrote: "In order to save the time and energy of arithmetic calculation and avoid people's tendency to make mistakes, this expectation should be as same as the algorithm science itself as possible." At that time, computers were regarded as "lazy thoughts" and were ridiculed.
In his proposal report, he described his views on this machine, especially the special design for scientific research, which made it obviously different from ordinary punching machines. He listed four main points:
First, ordinary machines can only handle positive numbers, while scientific machines must also be able to handle negative numbers; Secondly, scientific machines must be able to handle functions such as logarithm, sine and cosine. Third, computers should be very useful to scientists. Once put into operation, it can frequently process a large number of numerical data until the calculation is completed without human intervention. Fourth, this machine can calculate rows instead of columns, which can better keep the order of mathematical events.
IBM generously sponsored
The head of the physics department finally agreed to give Aiken the room he needed, but he had to build the machine first. Aiken sent his first proposal report to Monroe Computing Machine Company, and the result was quickly returned, but Monroe also told him that he could try IBM.
Mark 3 appeared on the cover of The Times.
This in turn prompted howard aiken to contact IBM. As a result, Thomas J. Watson (Sr., 1874- 1956), the president of IBM, was far-sighted and hit it off. He immediately spent $200,000 to support Aiken's dream machine, which was really an amazing figure at that time.
Because of the foresight of old Watson, IBM took the lead in entering the computer field among similar electrical and electronic companies. This strategic decision has laid a solid foundation for the development of IBM.
So he signed a contract to allow Aiken to cooperate with three IBM engineers to build a computer in the IBM laboratory in endicott. The machine was built from 1937 to 1943. Engineer Robert ·v·d· Campbell supervised the final assembly of the machine. The finished machine is 8 feet high, 5 1 foot long and 2 feet wide. The machine weighs 35 tons and consists of 760,000 parts, including 2,200 counting gears, 3,300 relays and 530 miles of wires. At that time, it was called IBM ASCC computer, which could perform five operations: addition, subtraction, multiplication, division and reference of previous results.
Mark computer settled in Harvard
As mentioned above, Aiken's thought was deeply influenced by Babbage's works, and he regarded the construction of ASCC as the completion of Babbage's unsuccessful career. Indeed, there are many similarities between ASCC and Babbage's analytical machines. Although it was once regarded as the first digital computer, its architecture is obviously different from that of modern computers. ASCC is driven by electricity, but its main components are still electromechanical, that is, the switching elements are relays acting through electromagnetic force. It consists of many calculators, each of which deals with the same problem under the guidance of its own control unit. In other words, it has 72 storage registers and processing units to complete multiplication and division operations. Neither instructions nor data can be stored in the machine. ASCC is controlled by the instruction sequence on perforated paper tape. Punched cards are used to input data, while the output of the machine is punched cards or teletypewriters. The word length of this machine is 23 digits. Addition and subtraction of these two numbers takes 3/ 10 seconds, multiplication takes 4 seconds, and division takes 10 seconds.
After ASCC computer was manufactured in 1943, it was presented to Harvard University by IBM, renamed Harvard Mark I computer, and then moved to Harvard University. 1944 August 14 Harvard University officially launched this computer, which has been running for 14 years. The machine first calculates physical and astronomical problems, such as electromagnetic field distribution and integral calculation of long focal length lens. Later calculations were related to radar and the atomic bomb explosion equation of Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico. In a word, this machine has done a lot of work for military computing projects, especially for the shooting and ballistics of the US Navy.
Machine of the year
Programming and application
Grace Hopper (1906- 1992) started working with Aiken on Mark's computer from 1944, and she focused on software development.
In order to make the machine work, the staff must write a program to convert the problem into a code that the computer can read. These codes are then converted into holes in perforated paper to represent simple instructions. After the paper tape is inserted into the hole reader, a series of detectors can detect the existence of the hole, so the corresponding relay can be turned off. These relay switches transmit information to other parts of the machine, and the registers in them store data. According to these data, the relevant calculations are carried out, and the final results are printed by an automatic typewriter.
The most commonly used instruction sets can be stored for later use, and repeated calls can save time. Grace. Hope later invented the programming language COBOL and took the lead in using these subroutines. Now programmers call it a library function. She also found moths trapped in relays in this laboratory and called them "bugs" of computers. Later, people also called errors in software "bugs" and "debugging".
Professor Aiken's graduate student, Dr. Anthony Oetinger, who graduated from 1954, once described the working state of the machine in this way. He said: "When the machine is running, the basement of the whole physical building will make a roaring noise. Some people say it's like a clicking and monotonous band, others say it's like a room full of women knitting sweaters on a knitting machine. " This monster works 24 hours a day. Whenever it stops, it will ring to remind the staff on duty to press the button or turn the knob, so that the computer can proceed to the next operation. Usually Aiken will run out of the nearby office to see how to deal with the problem.
Continue to make computers
Aiken's machine is slower than the slowest calculator today, but it is incredibly fast in 1944. At that time, The New York Times's article said: "According to the mathematician's dictation, equations that used to be solved in ordinary offices with a large number of calculators, many people and for a long time can now be solved in a few hours."
1945, Aiken began to build Mark II for the naval munitions department, which was used for the calculation of Dahlgrun proving ground. 1947 completed the Harvard Mark II, which is a completely electronic computer.
1950, he completed the Mark III computer, which is the so-called Aiken Dalgren Green Electronic Computer (ADEC). 1952, Aiken completed the Mark IV computer for the US Air Force.
Mark I
He not only devoted himself to making computers, but also applied magnetic cores and drums to computers. In Harvard Computing Lab, he also published books on mathematical linguistics, automatic language translation, electronics and switching theory, and also compiled the lab chronicle. In addition, Aiken founded the world's first complete degree program at Harvard University, which is what we call a computer science degree today. He also helped the University of Miami create a similar project. He even set up a consulting firm of Howard Aiken Industries in new york.
Regret and honor
Aiken was very keen on computers, but like many people at that time, he did not expect the amazing changes that computers would bring. For example, in 1947, he predicted that only six electronic digital computers could meet the computing needs of the whole United States. Today, you may think this is childish and ridiculous, but it accurately reflects people's general understanding of computers at that time. At that time, computers were usually used for scientific calculation and data processing in governments, large companies, research institutions and educational institutions. It is generally believed that computers can only be programmed and used by experts.
1964, Aiken accepted the Harry M. Goode Memorial Award, a medal and a prize of $2,000 provided by the American Computer Society. In recognition of his original contribution to the development of the first leading large-scale general automatic digital computer. This is just one of Aiken's many honors. His pioneering work has been appreciated by many countries, including the United States, France, the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany. Grace. Hope also won many honorary titles, and the Ministry of National Defense also awarded her the rank of Major General.
60 years have passed. At present, part of Mark I's equipment is in the hall of Harvard University Science Center, another part is in the Smithsonian American History Museum, and the last part is in the history exhibition of IBM. People will always remember Professor Aiken, a computer pioneer who made great contributions to the arrival of the computer age.
Re-edit this reference into the table of contents.