History of Computers timeline.

Analytical Engine, generally considered the first computer, designed and partly built by the English inventor Charles Babbage in the 19th century (he worked on it until his death in 1871). While working on the Difference Engine, a simpler calculating machine commissioned by the British government, Babbage began to imagine ways to improve it. Chiefly he thought about generalizing its operation so that it could perform other kinds of calculations.

In 1881, Herman Hollerith began designing a machine to tabulate census data more efficiently than by traditional hand methods. The U.S. Census Bureau had taken eight years to complete the 1880 census, and it was feared that the 1890 census would take even longer. Hollerith invented and used a punched card device to help analyze the 1890 U.S. census data. His great breakthrough was his use of electricity to read, count and sort punched cards whose holes represented data.

Turing machines are a fundamental concept in the theory of computation and play an important role in the field of computer science. They were first described by the mathematician and computer scientist Alan Turing in 1936 and provide a mathematical model of a simple abstract computer.

HP was founded by Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard in 1939. Their first product was an audio oscillator and one of their first customers Walt Disney. Disney used the oscillator to test audio equipment in the 12 specially equipped theaters showing Fantasia in 1940.

COBOL was designed in 1959 by CODASYL and was partly based on the programming language FLOW-MATIC, designed by Grace Hopper. It was created as part of a U.S. Department of Defense effort to create a portable programming language for data processing. It was originally seen as a stopgap, but the Defense Department promptly pressured computer manufacturers to provide it, resulting in its widespread adoption. It was standardized in 1968 and has been revised five times.

A graphical user interface (GUI) is created by designing a visual interface using elements like windows, icons, menus, and a pointer (often controlled by a mouse), allowing users to interact with a computer system through intuitive graphical elements rather than text commands, with the pioneering work done by researchers at Xerox PARC in the 1970s, most notably on the "Alto" computer, which laid the foundation for modern GUIs seen in systems like Apple Macintosh and Microsoft Windows.

Apple Computer Company was founded on April 1, 1976, by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne as a partnership. The company's first product is the Apple I, a computer designed and hand-built entirely by Wozniak. To finance its creation, Jobs sold his Volkswagen Bus, and Wozniak sold his HP-65 calculator. Neither received the full selling price but in total earned $1,300 (equivalent to $7,000 in 2023). Wozniak debuted the first prototype Apple I at the Homebrew Computer Club in July 1976.

Its development began after the Microsoft co-founder and spearhead of Windows 1.0, Bill Gates, saw a demonstration of a similar software suite, Visi On, at COMDEX in 1982. The operating environment was showcased to the public in November 1983, although it ended up being released two years later. Windows 1.0 runs on MS-DOS, as a 16-bit shell program known as MS-DOS Executive, and it provides an environment which can run graphical programs designed for Windows, as well as existing MS-DOS software.

In 1980, physicist Tim Berners-Lee, a contractor at CERN, proposed and prototyped ENQUIRE, a system for CERN researchers to use and share documents. In 1989, Berners-Lee wrote a memo proposing an Internet-based hypertext system. Berners-Lee specified HTML and wrote the browser and server software in late 1990. That year, Berners-Lee and CERN data systems engineer Robert Cailliau collaborated on a joint request for funding, but the project was not formally adopted by CERN.

In 1997, the first WiFi standard was developed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, from which the name IEEE 802.11 derives. This standard allowed for the transfer of data at 1Mbps.

The original iPhone was the first mobile phone to use multi-touch technology. Throughout its history, the iPhone has gained larger, higher-resolution displays, video-recording functionality, waterproofing, and many accessibility features. Up to the iPhone 8 and 8 Plus, iPhones had a single button on the front panel, with the iPhone 5s and later integrating a Touch ID fingerprint sensor.

Chromebooks are optimised for web access. They also run Android apps, Linux applications, and Progressive web apps which do not require an Internet connection. They are manufactured and offered by various OEMs. The first Chromebooks shipped on June 15, 2011.

The Apple Watch is a brand of smartwatch products developed and marketed by Apple. It incorporates fitness tracking, health-oriented capabilities, and wireless telecommunication, and integrates with watchOS and other Apple products and services. The Apple Watch was released in April 2015, and quickly became the world's best-selling wearable device.

In 2022, machine learning (ML) trends included the use of automated machine learning, MLOps, and low-code/no-code development. ML is a type of artificial intelligence (AI) that uses data to make predictions or decisions.

History of Computers

Analytical Engine

Punch Card

Turing Machine

HP

COBOL

GUI

Apple

Windows

HTML

Wi Fi

IPhone

Chrome Book

Apple Watch

Machine Learning