Computing Timeline
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Revision as of 12:53, 7 September 2017 by Crmaitland (talk | contribs)
Add your items to the list of events below. You must do the following for each item:
- Preserve the order of events
- Include the year
- Provide at least one reputable reference. Please remember that Wikipedia is not a valid reference.
- Include your first and last name.
- If someone else has added an event already, please make any modifications that you see fit and then add your name next to the other person's name.
- DO NOT copy items from Keith Pray's timeline.
| Date | Description | References | Name |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 BC | The abacus is invented. A frame made out of wood holding rods with sliding beads on them, used to aid in arithmetic calculations. | http://www.ee.ryerson.ca/~elf/abacus/history.html | Joshua Cuneo |
| 1640 | Pascal created the first mechanical calculator | Quinn M. Ethics for the information age. 7th ed. Pearson; 2016:6. | Ally Howell |
| 1831 | Michael Faraday invents the first electric dynamo | https://www.universetoday.com/82402/who-discovered-electricity/ | Ethan Schutzman |
| 1832 | The Military Enigma was announced and only available to the German Army | http://www.cryptomuseum.com/crypto/enigma/hist.htm | Jason Abel |
| 1836 | The ability of the Telegraph is demonstrated by Samuel Morse by using Morse code | http://www.wrvmuseum.org/morsecodehistory.htm | Jason Abel |
| 1844 | The Colossus, an electronic digital computer used to break the German Lorenz SZ-40 cipher machine, finally cracked its first message | http://cryptomuseum.com/crypto/colossus/index.htm | Jason Abel |
| 1844 | Morse sends the Telegraph message "What hath God wrought" to his partner opening up telegraph lines | https://www.loc.gov/collections/samuel-morse-papers/articles-and-essays/invention-of-the-telegraph/ | Rachel Manca |
| 1858 | The First Transatlantic Telgraph Cables | http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.ezproxy.wpi.edu/document/871324/ | B Bowers |
| 1860's | The first commercially successful typewriter invented by Christopher Latham Sholes with help from Carlos Gidden, Chief Lieutenant | http://blogs.ubc.ca/etec540sept12/2012/10/28/the-typewriter-a-remarkable-impact-on-communication/ | Jason Abel |
| 1865 | The concept of Email was introduced where you leave messages in another person's file directory for them to see later | http://www.nethistory.info/History%20of%20the%20Internet/email.html | Jason Abel |
| 1872 | Email sent over computer networks was created by Ray Tomlinson | http://www.nethistory.info/History%20of%20the%20Internet/email.html | Jason Abel |
| 1876 | Alexander Bell files for patent for the telephone | http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5252617 | Rachel Manca |
| 1880s | Heinrich Hertz completes first radar experiments | https://www.britannica.com/technology/radar/History-of-radar | Alex Hard |
| 1942 | The first all-electronic computer was built by John Anastoff and Clifford Berry at Iowa State University | https://www.ece.iastate.edu/the-department/history/history-of-computing/ | Jordan Burklund |
| 1915 | Ford Instruments MK1 Rangekeep created | https://www.usni.org/magazines/navalhistory/2015-10/armaments-innovations-revolutionary-rangekeeper | Alex Hard |
| 1923 | Enigma Machine Created | http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/topics/enigma | Alex Hard |
| 1929 | Tin Pan Alley songwriting company first began distributing music via paper song sheets, allowing for customers to enjoy music from the comfort of their own home and thus paving the way for future music distribution | http://ebookcentral.proquest.com.ezproxy.wpi.edu/lib/wpi/reader.action?ppg=3&docID=3038271&tm=1504739080522 | Henry Wheeler-Mackta |
| 1942 | LORAN (LOng RAnge Navigation) was first used by the allies | http://www.uscg.mil/history/missions/aton/LORAN/docs/LORAN_Volume_1_Index.asp | Alex Hard |
| 1943 | 4 wheel Bombe Machine used to defeat Enigma code | http://www.cryptomuseum.com/crypto/bombe/ | Alex Hard |
| 1950 | Alan Turing defined the Turing Test as an indicator of Artificial Intelligence. | S. J. Russell, P. Norvig, and E. Davis, Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach, 3rd ed. Prentice Hall, 2010. | Brian Zylich |
| 1972 | Alan C. Kay releases his paper titled "A Personal Computer for Children of All Ages", which is one of the first proposals for portable, paperless, and battery powered computers, leading to laptops and tablets becoming common consumer items. | http://history-computer.com/Library/Kay72.pdf | Jordan Burklund |
| 1974 | Bill Gates and Paul G. Allen found Microsoft | http://www.history.com/topics/inventions/invention-of-the-pc | Ethan Schutzman |
| 1975 | MITS Altair 8800 is released. At $297 for a kit, this is one of the first computers that is accessible to hobbyists. A BASIC interpreter written for this device also became the foundations of Microsoft. | http://www.computerhistory.org/timeline/computers/ | Jordan Burklund |
| 1957 | Air Material Command and the Aircraft Industries Association collaborated with MIT to produce the first Computer Numerical Controlled (CNC) machine. | http://machinist.org/cnc-computer-numerical-control/the-invention-of-cnc-machining/ | Cory Brolliar |
| 1961 | The first industrial robot (Unimate 1900) was put to market by George Devol | https://www.robotics.org/joseph-engelberger/unimate.cfm | Cory Brolliar |
| 1961 | Arthur Samuel developed a program based on Machine Learning that defeated a nationally-ranked checkers champion. | http://infolab.stanford.edu/pub/voy/museum/samuel.html | Brian Zylich |
| 1962 | Ivan Sutherland presents the first graphical user interface which used a light pen to manipulate objects displayed on a CRT. | https://3d-innovations.com/blog/the-history-of-computer-aided-design-cad/ | Cory Brolliar |
| 1966 | The Automatic Language Processing Advisory Committee published a report indicating that Machine Translation was hopeless, causing funding for Natural Language Processing to nearly disappear for 20 years. | http://www.hutchinsweb.me.uk/MTNI-14-1996.pdf | Brian Zylich |
| 1966 | The Development of Fiber Optic Cables | http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&u=mlin_c_worpoly&id=GALE%7CA241780798&v=2.1&it=r&sid=summon&ugroup=outside&authCount=1 | Stephen Hardy |
| 1968 | Ivan Sutherland (known as the "father of computer graphics") created the first Augmented Reality technology. | https://hbr.org/2016/10/the-mainstreaming-of-augmented-reality-a-brief-history | Cory Brolliar |
| 1968 | Douglas Engelbart demonstrates the "mother of all demos"and ushers in the era of GUIs and peripherals for computers. Mouse was first invented. | http://www.streusplit.readit-dtp.de/pdf/gui_history.pdf | Albert Enyedy |
| 1973 | James Lighthill published a report that criticized the field of AI for not delivering on its ambitious promises, causing an "AI Winter" where research in AI nearly slowed to a halt due to a lack of funding. | http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/4475849/ | Brian Zylich |
| 1973 | First Hand Held Cell Phone by Motorola | libraries.state.ma.us/login?gwurl=http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A162186706/SCIC?u=mlin_c_worpoly&xid=b7a0697a. | Bob Edwards |
| 1983 | A "network of networks" is created, the foundation of the modern internet | http://www.history.com/news/ask-history/who-invented-the-internet/ | Ethan Schutzman |
| 1983 | Apple develops the "Lisa" GUI. Lisa used icons to indicate documents or applications, and included the first pull-down menu. | http://www.streusplit.readit-dtp.de/pdf/gui_history.pdf | Albert Enyedy |
| 1984 | Charles Hull produces the first 3D printer technology | https://www.autodesk.com/redshift/history-of-3d-printing/ | Cory Brolliar |
| 1986 | National Science Foundation funds a 56Kbps cross-country network backbones | http://www.walthowe.com/navnet/History.html | Joshua Cuneo |
| 1987 | Acorn Computers creates "Arthur" GUI. First implementation of a taskbar. Also used anti-aliasing on the fonts, even in color mode, making the interface look more aesthetically pleasing. | http://www.streusplit.readit-dtp.de/pdf/gui_history.pdf | Albert Enyedy |
| 1988 | National Center of Biotechnology Information is established. | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/ | Ally Howell |
| 1989 | AIM Released | https://doi.org/10.1016/S0308-5961(02)00015-0 | Gerald Faulhaber |
| 1991 | Linus Torvaldis releases the first version of the Linux Kernel. | https://www.livinginternet.com/i/iw_unix_gnulinux.htm | Jordan Burklund |
| 1995 | Microslate Inc. patents a touch screen portable computer. | https://www.google.com/patents/US5379057 | Albert Enyedy |
| 1995 | The MPEG Audio Layer III encoding process and associated MP3 file type was released. Online music distribution would never be the same. | http://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2011/03/23/134622940/the-mp3-a-history-of-innovation-and-betrayal | Henry Wheeler-Mackta |
| 1997 | IBM's Deep Blue AI beat the world chess champion. | http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/ibm100/us/en/icons/deepblue/ | Brian Zylich |
| 1999 | The online music distribution service Napster released. Users could now download, listen, and share their music files illegitimately. Napster was the first of many popular music piracy services. | http://www-tandfonline-com.ezproxy.wpi.edu/doi/full/10.1080/1478601X.2011.561648?scroll=top&needAccess=true | Henry Wheeler-Mackta |
| 2000 | The online music distribution service LimeWire released. Unlike many competitors, LimeWire relied entirely on Peer-to-peer networking, thus removing the need for a centralized data server and making it much more difficult for the music industry to take meaningful legal action. | http://ebookcentral.proquest.com.ezproxy.wpi.edu/lib/wpi/reader.action?ppg=3&docID=3038271&tm=1504739080522 | Henry Wheeler-Mackta |
| 2001 | Apple's iTunes service releases, allowing for consumers to legally enjoy the benefits of online distribution without having to rely on illegitimate services. The music industry had finally caught up with evolving technology. | http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.wpi.edu/stable/pdf/30162196.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A84ef7bd9da4a285dff016c2c5b1bb0f9 | Henry Wheeler-Mackta |
| 2007 | Apple Releases the first iPhone | https://www.thesnugg.com/a-brief-history-of-smartphones.aspx | Ethan Schutzman |
| 2008 | The first Android based smartphone is released to consumers. | https://www.androidcentral.com/android-pre-history | Jordan Burklund |
| 2011 | John Deere Releases GreenStar system for farmers | http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.ezproxy.wpi.edu/document/1566333/ | Ally Howell |
| 2015 | Apple releases the apple watch, a major attempt to popularize wearable technology | https://www.apple.com/apple-watch-series-1/ | Ethan Schutzman |
| 2015 | Life insurers using genetic history to deny people insurance morality paper | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4259574/ | Ally Howell |
| 2017 | CEA-LIST Interactive Simulation Laboratory in France develops a "miniature haptic interface for the fingertips." This interface is intended for use with VR devices. | http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/7989971/ | Albert Enyedy |
