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THE EVERCHANGING COMPUTERS Analog Computers

The Evolution of Computers James Thomson
A computer is a programmable computing device that can process, store, He did the early foundational work on analog computation in the 19 th
and retrieve data. The computer data is processed according to the century. He invented a wheel and a disc integrator used in mechanical
software's instructions or commands. Computers play an integral part in analog devices. He then worked with his brother Lord Kelvin to create a
modern society by transforming the modern world into a global village. device that integrates a product of two functions.
History of Computer Kelvin then detailed a general-purpose analog machine for integrating linear
differential equations of any sequence. He also built a tide- predicting
The term “computer” originates as a word referring to someone who analog computer used at the Port of Liverpool until the 1960s. Tide-
manually carried out calculations instead of an actual machine. predicting machines are used to forecast tide patterns and their unsteady
height variations.
The 1940s and 1950s
Vannevar Bush
Large machines consisting of thousands of vacuum tubes were part of the
early digital computers built in this period. These typically filled an entire He developed the first large-scale, general-purpose analog computer called
room, but the computational power was only a fraction of the functions of the “Differential Analyzer.” This machine took up a large table and
personal computers today. weighed 100 tons, allowing integration and differential equation problems
to be quickly resolved.
The two distinct families of computing devices are digital computers
and historical analog computers. The Differential Analyzer also contained wheels, discs, shafts, and gears to
execute calculations and required a considerable set-up time by technicians
 Digital Computers – a sequential device that operates data one to solve equations. It contained up to 150 motors and lengthy wires
at a time. The data are represented in the binary format of “0” and connecting relays and vacuum tubes.
“1”; a single transistor is used to symbolize a binary digit.
Although the data representation in an analog computer is compact, it is
 Analog Computers: The representation of data reflects the constantly subjected to noise corruption. A single capacitor can symbolize
properties of the data being modeled in an analog computer. For one continuous variable in an analog computer, whereas various transistors
example, data and numbers may be represented by physical are needed in a digital computer.
quantities such as electric voltage, whereas digital computers use a
stream of binary digits to represent them. Analog computers were phased out shortly after World War II.

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Digital Computers Integrated Circuits (Third Generation)

Vacuum Tubes (First Generation) Jack Kilby of Texas Instruments invented the integrated circuit in 1958.
These consists of a set of electronic circuits on a small chip of
These devices depended on the flow of electric current through a vacuum. semiconductor material smaller than a circuit made of independent
Vacuum tubes were widely used in electronic devices such as televisions, components.
radios, and computers until the invention of transistors.
His idea to properly engineer a piece of germanium to act as several
The first generation of computers used thousands of bulky vacuum tubes, components simultaneously led to the birth of the first integrated circuit. Its
with several racks taking up an entire room. The vacuum tube used in the progress involved resizing transistors and arranging them on
early computers was a three-terminal device consisting of a cathode, grid, semiconductors. The use of semiconductors led to third-generation
and plate. computers, with significant advances in speed and efficiency.
The first generation of digital computers used vacuum tubes. Examples Users interacted with third-generation computers using keyboards and
include the Atanasoff-Berry Computer (ABC) developed in 1942, monitors and interfaced with an operating system. It allowed the device to
Colossus in 1944, Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer process several different applications simultaneously with a central program
(ENIAC) in the mid-1940s, Universal Automatic Computer I (UNIVAC that monitored the memory. Computers became accessible to a broader
I) in 1951; Whirlwind in 1951; and the IBM 701 in 1953. audience as they became smaller and cheaper.

Transistors (Second Generation) Microprocessors (Fourth Generation)

The transistor is the fundamental building block in modern electronic The Intel P4004 1969 microprocessor was the world’s first microprocessor.
systems for revolutionizing the field of electronics. Compared to vacuum It was the first semiconductor device that provided the functions of a
tubes, transistors were much smaller, cheaper, and more reliable based on computer at a chip level. It provided the basic building blocks for today’s
functionality. microcomputers, including the arithmetic- logic unit (ALU) and the control
unit.
A transistor is a three-terminal, solid-state electronic device that can control
electric current or voltage between two terminals. It is achieved by applying The rise of microprocessors led to the fourth generation of computers with
an electric current or voltage to the third terminal. A three- terminal thousands of integrated circuits placed onto a single silicon chip. A single
transistor allows an electric switch to be created, which can be controlled by chip could contain components of a computer from the control processing
another electrical switch. unit (CPU) and memory to input and output controls. Microprocessors
could fit in the palm, whereas first-generation computers filled an entire
The second generation of computers used transistors instead of vacuum room.
tubes, most evidently by the experiments by the University of Manchester.
The result of their experiment on the transistor computer was one of the All computers consist of two basic parts: hardware and software. The
earliest transistor computers whose prototype machine appeared in 1953, hardware is the physical part of the machine, while the software is a set of
with the full-size version commissioned in 1955. instructions that commands the computer what to do.

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Key Components of Computers b. Control Unit: This manages the computer device functions and is
the central component of the CPU.
A computer system is not just a single device operating independently. It
consists of various components with specific functions and features to Once the data is in the memory, it processes it for execution. It is
support the entire system. These components are divided into three key where the data conversion from human language to machine
components: Input Unit, Output Unit, and Central Processing Unit language occurs as it interprets the signal and sends it over to the
(CPU) – which is further divided into the memory unit, control unit, output unit.
and arithmetic-logic unit (ALU).
This unit maintains a data flow inside the system and transfers the
Input Unit commands to the arithmetic-logic unit.

A computer system responds to the instructions it receives from the users c. Arithmetic-Logical Unit (ALU): This processor is responsible
and uses an input unit to acquire those instructions. Input units take user for mathematical calculations and issues the computer system deals
commands in the form of data and convert them into a digital language with while functioning. It is also used for data comparison and
format sent to the processing unit for the next step. decision-making.

Examples of input units include a keyboard, mouse, scanner, joystick, and It has features to accomplish different mathematical solutions like
trackball. addition, subtraction, and multiplication, but it only performs the
calculation when necessary and then sends it to the output unit.
Central Processing Unit (CPU)
Output Unit
The data from the input unit proceeds to the processing unit before it is
executed. CPU understands the command and how it can be achieved. It When the input and central processing unit processes are accomplished, the
converts the data accepted in human language into machine language for data is fed to the output unit, where the result is shown. These devices
computers to interpret. always connect to the system, thus making coordination easier.

The CPU has three (3) main components: A computer monitor is one of the primary output devices that displays the
results to the user. Other examples include printers, projectors, speakers,
a. Memory Unit: When data reaches the processor from input headphones, and plotters.
devices, the memory unit saves it immediately. It has pre- existing
programs that transmit the data to the other parts of the CPU.

It is where all the information becomes available, and bits and

bytes (8 bits) are used to measure data size.

This unit is also responsible for storing data from input devices and
storing the result data from output devices.

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The Operating System Examples of Operating Systems

Operating System (OS) – a collection of software programs and Microsoft Windows
commands that control computer hardware to make it usable. It allows the
computing power of the hardware available to the computer users and It is a family of graphical operating systems created by Microsoft. The
manages the hardware to attain good system performance. original Windows 1.0 OS was introduced in 1985 as a graphical operating
system shell to compete with Apple’s GUI OS in 1984.
An operating system handles hardware such as the processors, input/output
devices, communication devices, and data, and it provides functionality, Currently, Microsoft Windows wins the personal computer and laptop
including hardware sharing, error recovery, and network communication market with over 90% market share. However, Windows has not been as
management. successful in dominating the smartphone and tablet market.
Advantages of Operating System
Mac OS

 Abstraction – allow users to hide details of hardware by It is the desktop operating system created by Apple Inc., designed to work
creating an abstraction. for Macintosh computers. Mac OS provides several different features, such
 Executable Programs offer an environment where users as a graphical user interface, multitasking, and memory security.
may execute programs or applications.
 User-friendly – provides the computer system with easy-to- use
format resources. Mobile Operating Systems

Disadvantages of Operating System Android

 Volatility: Users may lose all the contents stored in the It is a mobile operating system developed by Google and the Open Handset
computer system whenever an issue occurs. Alliance designed for touchscreen smartphones and tablets. The first
 Expensive: OS software is costly for small organizations, Android smartphone was released in late 2008, and Android remains the
which can cause an additional financial burden. most widely used mobile operating system.
 Unpredictable: It is never secure, as threats can happen
anytime. iOS

It is a mobile operating system for Apple’s smartphones and tablets. It was

developed from the MAC OS/X operating system in 2007. Multitasking for
iOS was introduced in 2010 with the release of iOS version 4.0.

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References:
Data Flair (n.d.a.). Components of a computer and their functions. [Web
Article]. Retrieved on July 5, 2022, from https://data-
flair.training/blogs/computer-components-with-functions/
O’Regan, G. (2021). A brief history of computing. Springer.
The Avinash Pandey (2022). 10 examples of operating systems.
Web Article]. Retrieved on July 5, 2022, from
https://quicklearncomputer.com/examples-of-operating-system- types-
of-operating-system

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