Talk:History of computing

message: Hi, I added a navigation box on several articles in this series (similar to that used in several other histories (including the History of the United States articles), to help tie the articles together, I hope this will help readers to see the thread between the history of computing overall in the sense that Michael Hardy means and the more narrow and common use senses.  I made this article the top-level.  I hope this is useful.   Perhaps some of the computing timelines could also be part of the navbox, but I thought I'd give people a chance to discuss what might be appropriate before hauling in a whole slew of new articles into the navbox. --Lexor 11:39, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)
thread_title: Add navigation box

message: So... who's interested in actually writing this article? Fredrik (talk) 20:57, 9 Jun 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I would be, if I knew anything.  It was actually this article that caused me to realize that I don't.  I know something of the history of mathematics, and I know that Euclid wrote about Euclid's algorithm, but I have no idea, e.g., how the ancient Greeks did multiplication, or when and how long division was introduced, etc. Michael Hardy 21:04, 9 Jun 2004 (UTC)

text: Unless someone else does it before then, I may make it my project of the week end. I don't know a lot about the subject, but I can go to the library and study :-). Then someone can correct my mistakes. David Remahl 21:02, 9 Jun 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Writing this article

message: Michael Hardy's program for this article could be realized in several directions, but it seems as if the directions are actually articles in themselves:
*the arithmetic operations, once we have a positional number system, could characterize multiplication of M by N as repeated addition of M, N times; likewise, division of M by N as repeated subtraction of a trial subtrahend from M and its succeeding minuends, N times, until we arrive at the Egyptian fraction, bringing us to continued fractions etc., in the cornucopia that is mathematics, but that would serve to cover up the relationship of the the arithmetic operations to computing with minutiae.
*the algorithms, such as Newton's method, the Runge-Kutta methods, and dozens of similar specialized methods for each kind of mathematical structure, and again, we have a cornucopia to deal with.
**the fact that there are usually limitations to the algorithms, meaning that they cannot be applied blindly, requiring judgement and the eventual resort to heuristics
So, does anyone have any suggestions? Ancheta Wis 00:10, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I think this would be a good project for Wikipedia:WikiProject_Computer_science which could use more members and advisors. Also Wikipedia:WikiProject_Mathematics. There is a lot of Computer and math stuff that could use better formatting and referencing. I'm just a learner in these topics, but I think you need a sense of History to gain some perspective. CQ 21:10, 24 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Possible directions for enhancement 

message: The lead section starts the definition (this is an Encyclopedia, remember, where things are defined) with these words:
 "The history of computing is longer than the history of computing hardware and modern computing technology..."
Has anyone ever read a more inept definition of a subject?   --SciCorrector (talk) 22:53, 10 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I would be more concerned by the fact that it says that this article is longer than [The history of computing hardware], when the latter is actually five times longer.
Thaum1el (talk) 09:17, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Some "definition" 

message: I started the section "books for futher reading" and I duplicated the list in history of computing hardware.  (Someone has kindly added to the lsit.)  There are more books that I'd like to add, but I don't want us to have to maintain the list in more than one place.  (There are probably other articles that could use this list too).  So would it be a good idea to make an article with just the list of books that can be linked from the other places?  Or is there a better way to do it and eliminate the duplication?  Bubba73 00:11, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  list of books 

message: In the history of computing, there are key people, John von Neumann, and Grace Murray Hopper, and Donald Knuth, just to mention a few.  Could we have a brief section in this article mentioning and linking to bios of people like them? MathStatWoman 23:10, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Mention of people

message: Excluding computing hardware is absurd, simply because computing hardware can be used for...computing.  I'm fine with a general page that lists both human and hardware computing history (keeping the additional page focused on hardware), but this page doesn't breakout any hardware history, and even the human history is very limited.  Superm401 - Talk 22:21, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Excluding hardware is absurd 

message: Most of inter-wiki links to other langages talks about computer science but this article is not about computer science. I'm removing some I can understand but not all... 152.81.12.56 07:36, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No wonder. Try taking some English Language lessons. You'll understand a lot more after that. --SciCorrector (talk) 22:56, 10 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Many links to other langage are wrong. 

message: As noted above, the title is misleading. Most sources consider the term "history of computing" to mean "the history of computer software and hardware." The misleading title has caused several serious problems:
#It appears at the top of the nav box for the history of computer software and hardware, suggesting that it is the main article on this subject. (It isn't.)
#The category "history of computing" uses the term in the standard way, but it uses this article as the lead article. This article doesn't even belong in that category, but rather in the history of mathematics.
#It makes external links to a number of sites which use the term in the standard way, rather than the quirky way this article does.
#Inter-language links (as noted above) are often wrong.
#Links into this article are often intended for history of computer hardware or history of computer science
I have no problem with an article that discusses the history of mathematical algorithms used for "computing" but all the above problems need to fixed. I will fix each of these if there are no objections. I notice that the discussion of the problem seems to have petered out about three years ago. ---- CharlesGillingham 18:05, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 02:42, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  <strike>Still un</strike>happy with this article 

message: I have found the above article in the list of those that need wikifying, and I wondered whether people who edit here would have a view on whether it needs to be merged, renamed, rewritten or otherwise altered, or perhaps just brought into your article series. Itsmejudith (talk) 21:58, 3 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Computer programming in the punch card era]] 

message: Is this article really suggesting computing started out with concrete?! This is either poor use of language, or the materials industry are unaware of the ancient use of concrete!  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.140.26.42 (talk) 08:23, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: See Abstract object --TedColes (talk) 09:07, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Concrete devices? 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just added archive links to  on History of computing. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add  after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add  to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/20140301151115/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxjbaQl0ad8 to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxjbaQl0ad8
When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.
Cheers. —cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 19:31, 18 October 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Done. Guy Harris (talk) 09:37, 31 October 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 7 external links on History of computing. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080119010548/http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/introduction/woi_knowledge.html to http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/introduction/woi_knowledge.html
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090705015058/http://dir.yahoo.com/Computers_and_Internet/History/ to http://dir.yahoo.com/Computers_and_Internet/History/
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090225171636/http://www.algana.co.uk/FamousNames/FamousNamesFrameset.htm to http://www.algana.co.uk/FamousNames/FamousNamesFrameset.htm
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20010605232405/http://www.ox.compsoc.net/~swhite/history.html to http://ox.compsoc.net/~swhite/history.html
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20071220022647/http://rk86.com/frolov/ to http://www.rk86.com/frolov/
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090405054226/http://www.trailing-edge.com/~bobbemer/HISTORY.HTM to http://www.trailing-edge.com/~bobbemer/HISTORY.HTM
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120504133240/http://www.computer50.org/ to http://www.computer50.org/
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 02:07, 5 November 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: There seems to be an unnecessary amount of stress being placed on the development of purely electric vacuum computers. The Z1 while being motor driven, and unreliable after extended use, featured programability via punched film, and this was in 1936. And it could multiplay and divide, which also isn't mentioned in the article, so theres that.  
The article seems to make little distinction between programmability via a labor intensive process of manually setting switches and plugs needed to run a program, and simply reading stored directions via a binary punched medium.
In terms of the Z1, Zuse's device was way ahead in terms of several important features and this article really doesn't want to talk about it.
With regards to the two other early modern computers which were ostensibly developed during the late 1930's: 
I am really struggling to find anything about Arthur Halsey Dickinson's (IBM) 1939 and Joseph Desch, NCR3566 (NCR) 1939. Does anyone here even know what these computers even looked like, or have images they can host? I sure don't. 
Just a working citation to anything about either of these inventions and their creators. This is a pretty big hole in History if no one is able to locate any publicly available schematics or information here. 
I mean, provided these inventions actually do exist, and weren't simply gambits to secure patent rights on possible future inventions, and were later mischaracterized in the compilation of history. It would be excellent if my hunch turns out to be nothing more than a product of simple ignorance, which hopefully someone will be able to remedy.
 
My biggest concern here is that neither of Arthur Dickinson or Joseph Desch have Wiki articles themselves, which is a little strange, considering the language of the article on the history of computing appears to suggest that these two would logically share the honor of being the sire figure to modern-day computing, which may not be an accurate characterization.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:14a:c100:d:595c:b157:e389:5d84 (talk) 08:31, 10 May 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  With regards to the timeline of computing, why is Zuse's Z1 mischaracterized? 

message: Might this be an alternative title for this article? TedColes (talk) 18:00, 19 June 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  History of computation