ICT 202 Lecture 9: Week 4: Brief history of computing
5 Feb 2019
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Document Summary
The first use of the term computer" was around 1600, and the meaning didn"t shift to refer to devices until late 1800"s and early. The abacus was an early aid for mathematical computations. Its only value is that it aids the memory of the human performing the calculation. A skilled abacus operator can work on addition and subtraction problems at the speed of a person equipped with a hand calculator. In 1617,an eccentric scotsman named john napier invented logarithms. A logarithm of a given number x is the exponent to which another fixed number, the base b, must be raised, to produce that number x. Ex: log 64= 6, as 64= 2 . Napier also invented an alternative to logarithm tables, where the logarithm values were carved on ivory sticks which are now called. Napier"s invention led directly to the slide rule, first built in english in.
