Trailblazers in Electromechanical Computing

Over the last six decades, electronic computing has spread so deeply in science and technology to became a fundamental tool for studying, researching and designing. Passing through vacuum tubes, transistors, integrated circuits and microprocessors, electronics has allows an amazing growth in computing power [1] and the recent commissioning in 2016 of the all-Chinese Sunway TaihuLight with a computing power 93 PFLOPS (1015 floating point operations per second), two and a half times larger than the previous world top supercomputer, the Chinese Tianhe-2 of 2013 powered with Intel processors, suggests that the evolution is still far from saturation. It is quite intriguing to wonder what was automatic computing before electronics started such a boost in computing power. Indeed, the search for mechanical tools aimed at relieving from the burden of computing goes far back into the past, at least to the ancient times when the abacus was built. However, it was with electricity that this possibility made a major step ahead

Punched-Card Systems and the Early Information Explosion, 1880–1945

At a time when Internet use is closely tracked and social networking sites supply data for targeted advertising, Lars Heide presents the first academic study of the invention that fueled today’s information revolution: the punched card. Early punched cards helped to process the United States census in 1890. They soon proved useful in calculating invoices and issuing pay slips. As demand for more sophisticated systems and reading machines increased in both the United States and Europe, punched cards served ever-larger data-processing purposes. Insurance companies, public utilities, businesses, and governments all used them to keep detailed records of their customers, competitors, employees, citizens, and enemies. The United States used punched-card registers in the late 1930s to pay roughly 21 million Americans their Social Security pensions, Vichy France used similar technologies in an attempt to mobilize an army against the occupying German forces, and the Germans in 1941 developed several punched-card registers to make the war effort—and surveillance of minorities—more effective. Heide’s analysis of these three major punched-card systems, as well as the impact of the invention on Great Britain, illustrates how different cultures collected personal and financial data and how they adapted to new technologies.This comparative study will interest students and scholars from a wide range of disciplines, including the history of technology, computer science, business history, and management and organizational studies

Data retrieval in mass spectrometry by an optical coincidence system

The object of this work was to develop an information storage and retrieval system for use in mass spectroscopy. The information to be stored was the compound\u27s name, the mass spectrum, and distinctive physical and chemical properties. It was desirable that the system be one that could be used in the mass spectral laboratory. At the time this project was initiated, no system for mass spectroscopy had been developed with the characteristics of simplicity, rapid retrieval, and practicality of use in the laboratory without elaborate and space consuming equipment. Thus, a system was needed to aid the laboratory personnel in compound identification and prediction of empirical formula and structure

Thermal radiation analysis system TRASYS 2: User's manual

The Thermal Radiation Analyzer System (TRASYS) program put thermal radiation analysis on the same basis as thermal analysis using program systems such as MITAS and SINDA. The user is provided the powerful options of writing his own executive, or driver logic and choosing, among several available options, the most desirable solution technique(s) for the problem at hand. This User's Manual serves the twofold purpose of instructing the user in all applications and providing a convenient reference book that presents the features and capabilities in a concise, easy-to-find manner

Machine Readable Race: Constructing Racial Information in the Third Reich

This paper examines how informational processing drove new structures of racial classification in the Third Reich. The Deutsche Hollerith-Maschinen Gesellschaft mbH (Dehomag) worked closely with the government in designing and integrating punch-card informational systems. As a German subsidiary of IBM, Dehomag’s technology was deployed initially for a census in order to provide a more detailed racial analysis of the population. However the racial data was not detailed enough. The Nuremberg Race Laws provided a more precise and procedural definition of Jewishness that could be rendered machine-readable. As the volume and velocity of information in the Reich increased, Dehomag’s technology was adopted by other agencies like the Race and Settlement Office, and culminated in the vision of a single machinic number for each citizen. Through the lens of these proto-technologies, the paper demonstrates the historical interplay between race and information. Yet if the indexing and sorting of race anticipates big-data analytics, contemporary power is more sophisticated and subtle. The complexity of modern algorithmic regimes diffuses obvious racial markers, engendering a racism without race

Smithsonian package for algebra and symbolic mathematics

Symbolic programming system for computer processing of algebraic expression

Thermal Radiation Analysis System (TRASYS)

A user's manual is presented for TRASYS, which is a digital software system with a generalized capability for solving radiation problems. Subroutines, file, and variable definitions are presented along with subroutine and function descriptions for the preprocessor. Definitions and descriptions of components of the processor are also presented

Teaching Ethics in the Information Systems Curriculum

This dissertation evaluates the importance of teaching ethics in the Information Systems curriculum. It begins with a review of the expectations and recommendations of three distinct academic and professional organizations (AACSB, IS2002 Model Curriculum, and ABET) specifically related to ethics teaching. This case study is centered on a set of ethics instruction that was used to teach ethics to senior level Information Systems students, which included a discussion of professional codes of ethics, mini-case studies, contemporary news events, a historical novel called IBM and the Holocaust (Black, 2001a), a Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC) ethics grid created by the instructor, and online discussions in WebCT. The students were surveyed at the end of the semester as to the effectiveness of the ethics instruction, and the quantitative results along with a qualitative data analysis of their online discussions and SDLC-Ethics grid is presented. An analysis of the data leads the researcher to believe that overall the students found the curriculum useful, with the reading of the IBM book and the SDLC-Ethics grid providing the most benefit

Computer programs for shielding problems in manned space vehicles

Computer programs for shielding problems in manned space vehicles - proton penetration code