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History of computing
Originally, the term "computer" referred to a person who performed numerical calculations under the direction of a mathematician, possibly with the aid of a variety of mechanical calculating devices such as the abacus onward. An example of an early computing device was the Antikythera mechanism, an ancient Greek device for calculating the movements of planets, dating from about 87 BCE. The end of the Middle Ages saw a reinvigoration of European mathematics and engineering, and by the early 17th century a succession of mechanical calculating devices had been constructed using clockwork technology.
Charles Babbage was the first to conceptualize and design a fully programmable computer as early as 1837, but due to a combination of the limits of the technology of the time, limited finance, and an inability to resist tinkering with his design (a trait that would in time doom thousands of computer-related engineering projects), the device was never actually constructed in his lifetime. A number of technologies that would later prove useful in computing, such as the punch card and the vacuum tube had appeared by the end of the 19th century, and large-scale automated data processing using punch cards was performed by tabulating machines designed by Hermann Hollerith.
During the first half of the 20th century, many scientific computing needs were met by increasingly sophisticated, special-purpose analog computers, which used a direct physical or electrical model of the problem as a basis for computation. These became increasingly rare after the development of the digital computer.
A succession of steadily more powerful and flexible computing devices were constructed in the 1930s and 1940s, gradually adding the key features of modern computers, such as the use of digital electronics (invented by Claude Shannon in 1937) and more flexible programmability. Defining one point along this road as "the first computer" is exceedingly difficult. Notable achievements include the Atanasoff Berry Computer, a special-purpose machine that used valve-driven (vacuum tube) computation, binary numbers, and regenerative memory; the American ENIAC (1943) which was one of the first general purpose machine, but still used the decimal system and incorporated an inflexible architecture that meant reprogramming it essentially required it to be rewired; the secret British Colossus computer (1944), which had limited programmability but demonstrated that a device using thousands of valves could be made reliable and reprogrammed electronically; and Konrad Zuse's Z machines, with the electromechanical Z3 (1941) being the first working machine featuring automatic binary arithmetic and feasible programability.
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