Ouch! Since my first motorcycle was a BSA (bolts, screws, and
adjustments) I'm conversant with oil leaks...

On 12/16/2016 7:53 AM, wrote:
On Friday, December 16, 2016 at 5:24:30 AM UTC-6, Martin Gregorie wrote:
On Thu, 15 Dec 2016 20:57:17 -0800, roel.baardman wrote:

I wonder if anyone said the same thing about computers in the early
days, Bob!
Unlikely that anybody did.

The very first electronic computers were built for code-breaking and to
calculate artillery range tables. Yes, these tasks could be done
manually, but not nearly as fast. Colossus played a major part in winning
WW2 while ENIAC went on from generating range tables to help design
second generation nukes: the Fat Man design calculations were done using
a roomful of IBM card equipment. See Richard Fyneman's books for more
detail.

The first commercial computers were built by Lyons in the UK. Lyons was
the Starbucks of its day, and used the first machine to streamline bakery
production for the next day's teashop requirements. That was a success
from day one, at least partly because they knew exactly what they wanted
the machine to do and the company already had a solid background in
process optimisation.


--
martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org |
Very unfortunate that these early UK computers never caught on, Martin. I hear rumors that you guys couldn't figure out how to make them leak oil?

--
Dan, 5J