page_title: Punched card
hierarchical_section_title: Punched card
caption_attribution_description: Close-up view of the punch cards used by Jacquard loom on display at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester, England. Photograph taken by George H. Williams in July, 2004.
context_page_description: A punched card or punch card is a piece of stiff paper that can be used to contain digital data represented by the presence or absence of holes in predefined positions. Digital data can be used for data processing applications or used to directly control automated machinery.
  Punched cards were widely used through much of the 20th century in the data processing industry, where specialized and increasingly complex unit record machines, organized into semiautomatic data processing systems, used punched cards for data input, output, and storage. The IBM 12-row/80-column punched card format came to dominate the industry. Many early digital computers used punched cards as the primary medium for input of both computer programs and data.
  While punched cards are now obsolete as a storage medium, as of 2012, some voting machines still use punched cards to record votes.
context_section_description: A punched card or punch card is a piece of stiff paper that can be used to contain digital data represented by the presence or absence of holes in predefined positions. Digital data can be used for data processing applications or used to directly control automated machinery.
  Punched cards were widely used through much of the 20th century in the data processing industry, where specialized and increasingly complex unit record machines, organized into semiautomatic data processing systems, used punched cards for data input, output, and storage.  The IBM 12-row/80-column punched card format came to dominate the industry. Many early digital computers used punched cards as the primary medium for input of both computer programs and data.
  While punched cards are now obsolete as a storage medium, as of 2012, some voting machines still use punched cards to record votes.
caption: Close-up of a Jacquard loom's chain, constructed using 8 × 26 hole punched cards
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