Digital Technology

Digital Technology book cover — Technology Timelines

Digital Technology — page 1 — Counting Frame An abacus is a simple calculator It was invented at least 5,000 years ago but it is still used in some places today Long numbers are shown by ﬂ icking beads along columns arranged side by side The lower section of this one counts from 1 to 5 and the upper beads show 5 and 10 Each column adds up to 15 Introduction Computers and other digital technologies are machines controlled by a set of instructions called a program The instructions are written as a string of digits numbers that a computer can understand Today computers are in many things from toys to telephones but they started out as machines for doing calculations A DIFFERENT VIEW COUNTING STONES An ancient technique used by shepherds to count their flocks was to make a pile of pebbles one for every sheep The Latin word for pebble is calculus which is where we get the word calculate The stone piles were the world’s first calculators 4

Digital Technology — page 2 — The Pascaline The word computer was ﬁ rst used in 1613 It meant a person who did complicated calculations In 1642 Frenchman Blaise Pascal invented the Pascaline a clockwork calculator to help these human computers It could add up to 999,999 Punched Card Loom In 1801 the French weaver Joseph Marie Jacquard invented the ﬁ rst programmable machine a loom for weaving patterned cloth The program was a pattern of holes punched into a set of cards The punched cards ran through the loom telling it when to add each color of thread to the cloth Designing the pattern Punching the cards Weaving the cloth 5

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