Coding and Computers: Discover the Amazing True Story of Computers!

By Lisa Regan and Roy Hermelin

Computers are such an important part of our everyday lives... but how much do you really know about them?

How does code work? Who invented the internet? This endlessly fascinating book not only explores the science behind information technology, but reveals the true-life stories of the people behind the scenes who played important roles in forging this radical transformation in human culture. It's absolutely packed with surprising and eye-opening facts, and a blast to read.

A great gift for kids aged 8+.

ABOUT THE SERIES: Science Stories is a vibrant educational series, focusing on the history of science and its major breakthroughs. Each title focuses on a different discipline - from computer science to the periodic table - brought to life by Roy Hermelin's full-colour illustrations.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Arcturus Publishing
• Release date: Aug 27, 2020
• ISBN: 9781398800571

Lisa Regan

Lisa Regan, the author of Finding Claire Fletcher, is a bestselling suspense novelist and a member of Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, and International Thriller Writers. She has a bachelor’s degree in English and a master’s degree in education from Bloomsburg University, works full-time as a paralegal, and lives with her husband and daughter in Philadelphia, where she writes books while waiting in line at the post office. Readers can learn more about her work at www.lisaregan.com.

Book preview

Chapter 1

In the beginning

The very first computing machines were designed to help with calculations. They were used to make mathematics easier, faster, and more accurate. Pioneering super-brains then saw how they could be programmed to carry out other helpful tasks, from processing census results to breaking coded messages during wartime. This was an era of groundbreaking ideas that pushed forward toward a new computer age.

BCE—Before the computer era

Can you imagine life without computers? Not just the one on your desk or at school, but also smartphones, tablets, games consoles, and all the other computerized gadgets that make life easier, from ordering in a fast food restaurant to controlling the traffic signals on the roads. There was a time, not all that long ago, when computers simply didn’t exist. How on earth did people manage?!

Human calculators

The computers we know today make all kinds of processes easier and faster, but computers were originally intended to help with adding and subtracting. Computing was making scientific calculations and predictions, and was done with pen, paper, and the brain. Clever people were hired to work out long and complicated calculations, such as the positions of planets and other objects in space. The first female professional astronomer was just such a person—Maria Mitchell (1818–1889) began by doing navigational computations for sailors, and then worked for years trying to compute the motion of Venus.

Tools of the trade

The first adding and subtracting machine, or calculator, was the abacus. The word calculate comes from the Latin for small stone. An abacus had stones or beans that could be moved in grooves in the sand. Later ones had beads inside a wooden frame. An abacus doesn’t actually do the sums, it simply lets the person keep track of numbers while he or she does the calculating.

A mechanical breakthrough

Blaise Pascal was a seventeenth-century inventor and mathematician. As a teenager, he wanted to make his father’s job of calculating taxes easier, so he set about inventing a calculator. The result, known as the Pascaline, was a simple calculating device that could add and subtract.

Testing times

The Pascaline, built in 1642–1644, had moving drums and gears inside a box, and dials on the top. Numbers were entered by turning the dials. The input numbers and results were shown in small windows above the dials, with a sliding plate that covered one or the other. Pascal encountered many problems with his device, and made 50 prototypes over 10 years.

A mathematical marvel

Pascal was extremely clever even as a young child. He was educated at home by his father, himself a talented mathematician. He actually refused to teach his son mathematics at first, as he worried that it would fascinate the boy so much that he would be distracted from his other subjects. Of course, this made Pascal even more interested in the forbidden topic, and he began to teach himself. By the age of 16 he was attending meetings with many of Paris’s leading thinkers and mathematicians.

Stepping it up

Blaise Pascal’s mechanical calculator could perform only addition and subtraction. The challenge was to build a machine that could also multiply and divide. In 1671, German mathematician Gottfried Leibniz invented a device that did exactly that. It has become known as the Stepped Reckoner and was based on a gear that is now called the Leibniz wheel. Leibniz made two prototypes, but only one of them survived. It was found tucked away in the attic of a German university around 120 years after Leibniz’s death.

A great thinker

Leibniz was ahead of his time. He dreamed of inventing a machine that would solve all kinds of problems, not only calculations, and was convinced that a calculating device could work using the binary system (using only numbers 0 and 1, as modern computers do). However, his Stepped Reckoner was designed around the decimal system, using numbers 0–9. It contained metal cylinders with rows of teeth that linked together to crunch the numbers. Unfortunately, the machine needed pieces that were too intricate to be made accurately so parts often became jammed.

Leading the way

The Stepped Reckoner was the first machine that could perform all four mathematical functions. It inspired other attempts to make a machine that could do multiplication and division automatically. In 1770, Philipp Matthäus Hahn managed to build two that were based on Leibniz wheels, and Lord Stanhope also designed a machine using these wheels in 1777. Leibniz’s uniquely designed mechanism was the basis for many successful calculators for the next 275 years.

Early inspiration

The breakthrough idea for modern programmable computers came from an unlikely source—the weaving industry. It was a system of cards punched with holes. These cards provided instructions to an automatic loom, so that a skilled worker could produce beautiful patterns in the cloth at great speeds. The system was devised by French weaver Joseph Marie Jacquard in the early 1800s.

Under attack

The Jacquard loom was the first machine that could be programmed. It could automatically reproduce complicated designs just by following rows and rows of holes on the cards. Many cards could be fixed together in a long chain, so the design was not restricted by the size of the instruction cards. The early loom had many opponents. People thought that it would put them out of work, and attacked its inventor and destroyed his loom. It was only the intervention of the French Emperor Napoleon that allowed Jacquard to develop and perfect his design.

Expanding ideas

This punched-card method of programming became popular in many other devices. It has been used for centuries in music machines and mechanical organs. The holes in the cards dictate which notes are played, to produce a perfect tune with no need for an organist. It was also used in mechanical counters and calculators, and was the inspiration for the first true automatic computing engines designed by Charles Babbage (see page 14).

A pair of engines

Englishman Charles Babbage (1791–1871) is credited as the inventor of the first automatic computing machines, though he never managed to build one. His goal was to design a mechanical calculator that would carry out mathematical functions much more accurately than humans could. However, problems with engineering and finances meant that his ideas were never fully carried out.

Too tricky

The first of Babbage’s designs was known as the Difference Engine. He worked on it between 1819 and 1822. It was a calculating machine that used the decimal system and was powered by cranking a handle. It would print out results in a table. Though the British government funded his work, it never got off the ground. The machine needed 25,000 precision-engineered parts that couldn’t be made at that time within the budget.

Too late

By 1832, Babbage had made a small test model, but his thoughts had already moved on to a more general machine called the Analytical Engine. It would be able to do many more tasks, and would be digital (working only with numbers), automatic, mechanical, and controlled by different programs using punched cards. It was, in effect, the first computer. It would also be huge, steam-driven, and made of brass. However, he couldn’t get funding and died before it was built.

The Enchantress of Numbers

Babbage worked closely with a mathematician and writer named Ada Lovelace (1815–1832). She saw, before Babbage himself did, that his Analytical Engine had the potential to perform tasks other than mathematical calculations. Lovelace predicted that computers would become hugely important in many aspects of life. It was Babbage who dubbed her the Enchantress of Numbers, thanks to her imaginative approach to mathematical problems.

Dream team

Lovelace first heard about Babbage’s machine when she was just 17, and wrote to him to offer her help. They became very good friends and enjoyed working together. She later read and translated a paper by an Italian engineer, Luigi Menabrea, about the Analytical Engine. She also corrected mistakes he made in it! Babbage encouraged her to add her own groundbreaking ideas of how the Engine could handle inputs, outputs, processing, and data storage.

Coding pioneer

These ideas were published with Menabrea’s work, with Lovelace’s contribution simply called Notes. Within them, she outlined a set of instructions, or algorithm, to get the Analytical Engine to do sums. This is commonly said to be the world’s first computer program. She also wrote of her other visions of what the Engine might do, including composing music and creating art, all through coding.

A population problem

Necessity is the mother of invention, as the saying goes, and by the 1880s, there was a huge need for a machine that could handle data quickly and efficiently. The number of people in the US was growing fast, and estimates suggested that hand-processing the results of the 1890 population census would take more than 10 years. That meant the next set of results would