ENIAC in Action

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Author :
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262334437
Total Pages : 362 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (623 download)

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Book Synopsis ENIAC in Action by : Thomas Haigh

Download or read book ENIAC in Action written by Thomas Haigh and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2016-06-24 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The history of the first programmable electronic computer, from its conception, construction, and use to its afterlife as a part of computing folklore. Conceived in 1943, completed in 1945, and decommissioned in 1955, ENIAC (the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer) was the first general-purpose programmable electronic computer. But ENIAC was more than just a milestone on the road to the modern computer. During its decade of operational life, ENIAC calculated sines and cosines and tested for statistical outliers, plotted the trajectories of bombs and shells, and ran the first numerical weather simulations. ENIAC in Action tells the whole story for the first time, from ENIAC's design, construction, testing, and use to its afterlife as part of computing folklore. It highlights the complex relationship of ENIAC and its designers to the revolutionary approaches to computer architecture and coding first documented by John von Neumann in 1945. Within this broad sweep, the authors emphasize the crucial but previously neglected years of 1947 to 1948, when ENIAC was reconfigured to run what the authors claim was the first modern computer program to be executed: a simulation of atomic fission for Los Alamos researchers. The authors view ENIAC from diverse perspectives—as a machine of war, as the “first computer,” as a material artifact constantly remade by its users, and as a subject of (contradictory) historical narratives. They integrate the history of the machine and its applications, describing the mathematicians, scientists, and engineers who proposed and designed ENIAC as well as the men—and particularly the women who—built, programmed, and operated it.

ENIAC in Action

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Author :
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262033984
Total Pages : 362 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (62 download)

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Book Synopsis ENIAC in Action by : Thomas Haigh

Download or read book ENIAC in Action written by Thomas Haigh and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2016-02-05 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work explores the conception, design, construction, use, and afterlife of ENIAC, the first general purpose digital electronic computer.

A New History of Modern Computing

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Author :
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262366479
Total Pages : 545 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (623 download)

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Book Synopsis A New History of Modern Computing by : Thomas Haigh

Download or read book A New History of Modern Computing written by Thomas Haigh and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2021-09-14 with total page 545 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How the computer became universal. Over the past fifty years, the computer has been transformed from a hulking scientific supertool and data processing workhorse, remote from the experiences of ordinary people, to a diverse family of devices that billions rely on to play games, shop, stream music and movies, communicate, and count their steps. In A New History of Modern Computing, Thomas Haigh and Paul Ceruzzi trace these changes. A comprehensive reimagining of Ceruzzi's A History of Modern Computing, this new volume uses each chapter to recount one such transformation, describing how a particular community of users and producers remade the computer into something new. Haigh and Ceruzzi ground their accounts of these computing revolutions in the longer and deeper history of computing technology. They begin with the story of the 1945 ENIAC computer, which introduced the vocabulary of "programs" and "programming," and proceed through email, pocket calculators, personal computers, the World Wide Web, videogames, smart phones, and our current world of computers everywhere--in phones, cars, appliances, watches, and more. Finally, they consider the Tesla Model S as an object that simultaneously embodies many strands of computing.

A History of Modern Computing, second edition

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Author :
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 9780262532037
Total Pages : 468 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (32 download)

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Book Synopsis A History of Modern Computing, second edition by : Paul E. Ceruzzi

Download or read book A History of Modern Computing, second edition written by Paul E. Ceruzzi and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2003-04-08 with total page 468 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the first digital computer to the dot-com crash—a story of individuals, institutions, and the forces that led to a series of dramatic transformations. This engaging history covers modern computing from the development of the first electronic digital computer through the dot-com crash. The author concentrates on five key moments of transition: the transformation of the computer in the late 1940s from a specialized scientific instrument to a commercial product; the emergence of small systems in the late 1960s; the beginning of personal computing in the 1970s; the spread of networking after 1985; and, in a chapter written for this edition, the period 1995-2001. The new material focuses on the Microsoft antitrust suit, the rise and fall of the dot-coms, and the advent of open source software, particularly Linux. Within the chronological narrative, the book traces several overlapping threads: the evolution of the computer's internal design; the effect of economic trends and the Cold War; the long-term role of IBM as a player and as a target for upstart entrepreneurs; the growth of software from a hidden element to a major character in the story of computing; and the recurring issue of the place of information and computing in a democratic society. The focus is on the United States (though Europe and Japan enter the story at crucial points), on computing per se rather than on applications such as artificial intelligence, and on systems that were sold commercially and installed in quantities.

Grace Hopper and the Invention of the Information Age

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Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262517264
Total Pages : 405 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (625 download)

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Book Synopsis Grace Hopper and the Invention of the Information Age by : Kurt W. Beyer

Download or read book Grace Hopper and the Invention of the Information Age written by Kurt W. Beyer and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2012-02-10 with total page 405 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The career of computer visionary Grace Murray Hopper, whose innovative work in programming laid the foundations for the user-friendliness of today's personal computers that sparked the information age. A Hollywood biopic about the life of computer pioneer Grace Murray Hopper (1906–1992) would go like this: a young professor abandons the ivy-covered walls of academia to serve her country in the Navy after Pearl Harbor and finds herself on the front lines of the computer revolution. She works hard to succeed in the all-male computer industry, is almost brought down by personal problems but survives them, and ends her career as a celebrated elder stateswoman of computing, a heroine to thousands, hailed as the inventor of computer programming. Throughout Hopper's later years, the popular media told this simplified version of her life story. In Grace Hopper and the Invention of the Information Age, Kurt Beyer reveals a more authentic Hopper, a vibrant and complex woman whose career paralleled the meteoric trajectory of the postwar computer industry. Both rebellious and collaborative, Hopper was influential in male-dominated military and business organizations at a time when women were encouraged to devote themselves to housework and childbearing. Hopper's greatest technical achievement was to create the tools that would allow humans to communicate with computers in terms other than ones and zeroes. This advance influenced all future programming and software design and laid the foundation for the development of user-friendly personal computers.

The Climate Demon

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Author :
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 131651076X
Total Pages : 399 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (165 download)

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Book Synopsis The Climate Demon by : R. Saravanan

Download or read book The Climate Demon written by R. Saravanan and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-10-21 with total page 399 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An introduction to the complex world of climate models that explains why we should trust their predictions despite the uncertainties.

Exploring the Early Digital

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Author :
Publisher : Springer
ISBN 13 : 9783030021511
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (215 download)

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Book Synopsis Exploring the Early Digital by : Thomas Haigh

Download or read book Exploring the Early Digital written by Thomas Haigh and published by Springer. This book was released on 2019-05-10 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Changes in the present challenge us to reinterpret the past, but historians have not yet come to grips with the convergence of computing, media, and communications technology. Today these things are inextricably intertwined, in technologies such as the smartphone and internet, in convergent industries, and in social practices. Yet they remain three distinct historical subfields, tilled by different groups of scholars using different tools. We often call this conglomeration “the digital,” recognizing its deep connection to the technology of digital computing. Unfortunately, interdisciplinary studies of digital practices, digital methods, or digital humanities have rarely been informed by deep engagement with the history of computing.Contributors to this volume have come together to reexamine an apparently familiar era in the history of computing through new lenses, exploring early digital computing and engineering practice as digital phenomena rather than as engines of mathematics and logic. Most focus on the period 1945 to 1960, the era in which the first electronic digital computers were created and the computer industry began to develop. Because digitality is first and foremost a way of reading objects and encoding information within them, we are foregrounding topics that have until now been viewed as peripheral in the history of computing: betting odds calculators, card file systems, program and data storage, programmable calculators, and digital circuit design practices. Reconceptualizing the “history of computing” as study of the “early digital” decenters the stored program computer, repositioning it as one of many digital technologies.

Thinking Machines

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Author :
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 1524704415
Total Pages : 290 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (247 download)

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Book Synopsis Thinking Machines by : Luke Dormehl

Download or read book Thinking Machines written by Luke Dormehl and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2017-03-07 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating look at Artificial Intelligence, from its humble Cold War beginnings to the dazzling future that is just around the corner. When most of us think about Artificial Intelligence, our minds go straight to cyborgs, robots, and sci-fi thrillers where machines take over the world. But the truth is that Artificial Intelligence is already among us. It exists in our smartphones, fitness trackers, and refrigerators that tell us when the milk will expire. In some ways, the future people dreamed of at the World's Fair in the 1960s is already here. We're teaching our machines how to think like humans, and they're learning at an incredible rate. In Thinking Machines, technology journalist Luke Dormehl takes you through the history of AI and how it makes up the foundations of the machines that think for us today. Furthermore, Dormehl speculates on the incredible--and possibly terrifying--future that's much closer than many would imagine. This remarkable book will invite you to marvel at what now seems commonplace and to dream about a future in which the scope of humanity may need to broaden itself to include intelligent machines.

Turing's Cathedral

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Author :
Publisher : Pantheon
ISBN 13 : 0375422773
Total Pages : 466 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (754 download)

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Book Synopsis Turing's Cathedral by : George Dyson

Download or read book Turing's Cathedral written by George Dyson and published by Pantheon. This book was released on 2012 with total page 466 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Documents the innovations of a group of eccentric geniuses who developed computer code in the mid-20th century as part of mathematician Alan Turin's theoretical universal machine idea, exploring how their ideas led to such developments as digital television, modern genetics and the hydrogen bomb.

John von Neumann: The Scientific Genius Who Pioneered the Modern Computer, Game Theory, Nuclear Deterrence, and Much More

Download John von Neumann: The Scientific Genius Who Pioneered the Modern Computer, Game Theory, Nuclear Deterrence, and Much More PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Plunkett Lake Press
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 253 pages
Book Rating : 4./5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis John von Neumann: The Scientific Genius Who Pioneered the Modern Computer, Game Theory, Nuclear Deterrence, and Much More by : Norman Macrae

Download or read book John von Neumann: The Scientific Genius Who Pioneered the Modern Computer, Game Theory, Nuclear Deterrence, and Much More written by Norman Macrae and published by Plunkett Lake Press. This book was released on 2019-07-31 with total page 253 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: John von Neumann was a Jewish refugee from Hungary — considered a “genius” like fellow Hungarians Leo Szilard, Eugene Wigner and Edward Teller — who played key roles developing the A-bomb at Los Alamos during World War II. As a mathematician at Princeton’s Institute for Advanced Study (where Einstein was also a professor), von Neumann was a leader in the development of early computers. Later, he developed the new field of game theory in economics and became a top nuclear arms policy adviser to the Truman and Eisenhower administrations. “I always thought [von Neumann’s] brain indicated that he belonged to a new species, an evolution beyond man. Macrae shows us in a lively way how this brain was nurtured and then left its great imprint on the world.” — Hans A. Bethe, Cornell University “The book makes for utterly captivating reading. Von Neumann was, of course, one of this century’s geniuses, and it is surprising that we have had to wait so long... for a fully fleshed and sympathetic biography of the man. But now, happily, we have one. Macrae nicely delineates the cultural, familial, and educational environment from which von Neumann sprang and sketches the mathematical and scientific environment in which he flourished. It’s no small task to render a genius like von Neumann in ordinary language, yet Macrae manages the trick, providing more than a glimpse of what von Neumann accomplished intellectually without expecting the reader to have a Ph.D. in mathematics. Beyond that, he captures von Neumann’s qualities of temperament, mind, and personality, including his effortless wit and humor. And [Macrae] frames and accounts for von Neumann’s politics in ways that even critics of them, among whom I include myself, will find provocative and illuminating.” — Daniel J. Kevles, California Institute of Technology “A lively portrait of the hugely consequential nonmathematician-physicist-et al., whose genius has left an enduring impress on our thought, technology, society, and culture. A double salute to Steve White, who started this grand book designed for us avid, nonmathematical readers, and to Norman Macrae, who brought it to a triumphant conclusion.” — Robert K. Merton, Columbia University “The first full-scale biography of this polymath, who was born Jewish in Hungary in 1903 and died Roman Catholic in the United States at the age of 53. And Mr. Macrae has some great stories to tell... Mr. Macrae’s biography has rescued a lot of good science gossip from probable extinction, and has introduced many of us to the life story of a man we ought to know better.” — Ed Regis, The New York Times “A nice and fascinating picture of a genius who was active in so many domains.” —Zentralblatt MATH “Biographer Macrae takes a ‘viewspaperman’ approach which stresses the context and personalities associated with von Neumann’s remarkable life, rather than attempting to give a detailed scholarly analysis of von Neumann’s papers. The resulting book is a highly entertaining account that is difficult to put down.” — Journal of Mathematical Psychology “A full and intimate biography of ‘the man who consciously and deliberately set mankind moving along the road that led us into the Age of Computers.’” — Freeman Dyson, Princeton, NJ “It is good to have a biography of one of the most important mathematicians of the twentieth century, even if it is a biography that focuses much more on the man than on the mathematics.” — Fernando Q. Gouvêa, Mathematical Association of America “Based on much research, his own and that of others (especially of Stephen White), Macrae has written a valuable biography of this remarkable genius of our century, without the opacity of technical (mathematical) dimensions that are part of the hero’s intellectual contributions to humanity. Interesting, informative, illuminating, and insightful.” — Choice Review “Macrae paints a highly readable, humanizing portrait of a man whose legacy still influences and shapes modern science and knowledge.” — Resonance, Journal of Science Education “In this affectionate, humanizing biography, former Economist editor Macrae limns a prescient pragmatist who actively fought against fascism and who advocated a policy of nuclear deterrence because he foresaw that Stalin’s Soviet Union would rapidly acquire the bomb and develop rocketry... Macrae makes [von Neumann’s] contributions accessible to the lay reader, and also discusses von Neumann’s relationships with two long-suffering wives, his political differences with Einstein and the cancer that killed him.” — Publishers Weekly “Macrae’s life of the great mathematician shows dramatically what proper care and feeding can do for an unusually capacious mind.” — John Wilkes, Los Angeles Times

The Computer Guy Is Here!

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Author :
Publisher : Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN 13 : 9781545083178
Total Pages : 170 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (831 download)

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Book Synopsis The Computer Guy Is Here! by : John Sak

Download or read book The Computer Guy Is Here! written by John Sak and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2018-01-25 with total page 170 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Way back in the last century, back in the 1960s, computers were mammoth mysterious machines. They were immensely expensive yet became essential to daily business operations. Yet, no one ever saw them. Security dictated they be hidden away. Only the computer operators were allowed access. These were the important people who actually made the computer do useful work. On the other hand, these knowledgeable operators knew absolutely nothing of the technology behind the covers. Whenever a problem arose, there was no choice but to call the Computer Guy. Frantically a supervisor would place a call for service. Then wait. And wait. Little could be done without the computer running. Finally! At long last, someone would yell out, "The computer guy is here!" Following a brief greeting, the thankful supervisor immediately wanted to know how long it would take to get the computer running again. So, with everyone anxiously looking over his shoulder, the computer guy set about his business of determining the cause and finding a solution to the problem. Clearly a stressful situation. Yet this was only a minor portion of an essential career from the early days of the Computer Era. The Computer Guys were the Field Engineers who installed, maintained and repaired those old mainframe computers. Their place in technological history is finally documented.

Cape

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Author :
Publisher : Aladdin
ISBN 13 : 1534439110
Total Pages : 336 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (344 download)

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Book Synopsis Cape by : Kate Hannigan

Download or read book Cape written by Kate Hannigan and published by Aladdin. This book was released on 2019-08-06 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Readers…will be enamored by this blend of history, mystery, and superpowered action.” —Booklist (starred review) “Has the exciting pace of a superhero adventure.” —Kirkus Reviews Hidden Figures meets Wonder Woman in this action-packed, comic-inspired adventure about a brilliant girl puzzler who discovers she’s part of a superhero team—the first in a new series! Josie O’Malley does a lot to help out Mam after her father goes off to fight the Nazis, but she wishes she could do more—like all those caped heroes who now seem to have disappeared. If Josie can’t fly and control weather like her idol, Zenobia, maybe she can put her math smarts to use cracking puzzles for the government. After an official tosses out her puzzler test because she’s a girl, it soon becomes clear that an even more top-secret agency has its eye on Josie, along with two other applicants: Akiko and Mae. The trio bonds over their shared love of female superhero celebrities, from Hauntima to Zenobia to Hopscotch. But during one extraordinary afternoon, they find themselves transformed into the newest (and youngest!) superheroes in town. As the girls’ abilities slowly begin to emerge, they learn that their skills will be crucial in thwarting a shapeshifting henchman of Hitler, and, just maybe, in solving an even larger mystery about the superheroes who’ve recently gone missing. Inspired by remarkable real-life women from World War II—the human computers and earliest programmers called “the ENIAC Six”—this pulse-pounding adventure features bold action and brave thinking, with forty-eight pages of comic book style graphic panels throughout the book. Readers will want to don their own capes for an adventure, and realize they have the power to be a superhero, too!

Reckoners

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Author :
Publisher : Greenwood
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 200 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (91 download)

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Book Synopsis Reckoners by : Paul E. Ceruzzi

Download or read book Reckoners written by Paul E. Ceruzzi and published by Greenwood. This book was released on 1983 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Code

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Author :
Publisher : Microsoft Press
ISBN 13 : 0137909292
Total Pages : 563 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (379 download)

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Book Synopsis Code by : Charles Petzold

Download or read book Code written by Charles Petzold and published by Microsoft Press. This book was released on 2022-08-02 with total page 563 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The classic guide to how computers work, updated with new chapters and interactive graphics "For me, Code was a revelation. It was the first book about programming that spoke to me. It started with a story, and it built up, layer by layer, analogy by analogy, until I understood not just the Code, but the System. Code is a book that is as much about Systems Thinking and abstractions as it is about code and programming. Code teaches us how many unseen layers there are between the computer systems that we as users look at every day and the magical silicon rocks that we infused with lightning and taught to think." - Scott Hanselman, Partner Program Director, Microsoft, and host of Hanselminutes Computers are everywhere, most obviously in our laptops and smartphones, but also our cars, televisions, microwave ovens, alarm clocks, robot vacuum cleaners, and other smart appliances. Have you ever wondered what goes on inside these devices to make our lives easier but occasionally more infuriating? For more than 20 years, readers have delighted in Charles Petzold's illuminating story of the secret inner life of computers, and now he has revised it for this new age of computing. Cleverly illustrated and easy to understand, this is the book that cracks the mystery. You'll discover what flashlights, black cats, seesaws, and the ride of Paul Revere can teach you about computing, and how human ingenuity and our compulsion to communicate have shaped every electronic device we use. This new expanded edition explores more deeply the bit-by-bit and gate-by-gate construction of the heart of every smart device, the central processing unit that combines the simplest of basic operations to perform the most complex of feats. Petzold's companion website, CodeHiddenLanguage.com, uses animated graphics of key circuits in the book to make computers even easier to comprehend. In addition to substantially revised and updated content, new chapters include: Chapter 18: Let's Build a Clock! Chapter 21: The Arithmetic Logic Unit Chapter 22: Registers and Busses Chapter 23: CPU Control Signals Chapter 24: Jumps, Loops, and Calls Chapter 28: The World Brain From the simple ticking of clocks to the worldwide hum of the internet, Code reveals the essence of the digital revolution.

Computer Organization and Design RISC-V Edition

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Author :
Publisher : Morgan Kaufmann
ISBN 13 : 0128122765
Total Pages : 700 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (281 download)

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Book Synopsis Computer Organization and Design RISC-V Edition by : David A. Patterson

Download or read book Computer Organization and Design RISC-V Edition written by David A. Patterson and published by Morgan Kaufmann. This book was released on 2017-05-12 with total page 700 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The new RISC-V Edition of Computer Organization and Design features the RISC-V open source instruction set architecture, the first open source architecture designed to be used in modern computing environments such as cloud computing, mobile devices, and other embedded systems. With the post-PC era now upon us, Computer Organization and Design moves forward to explore this generational change with examples, exercises, and material highlighting the emergence of mobile computing and the Cloud. Updated content featuring tablet computers, Cloud infrastructure, and the x86 (cloud computing) and ARM (mobile computing devices) architectures is included. An online companion Web site provides advanced content for further study, appendices, glossary, references, and recommended reading. - Features RISC-V, the first such architecture designed to be used in modern computing environments, such as cloud computing, mobile devices, and other embedded systems - Includes relevant examples, exercises, and material highlighting the emergence of mobile computing and the cloud

The Dream Machine

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Author :
Publisher : Stripe Press
ISBN 13 : 1953953360
Total Pages : 583 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (539 download)

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Book Synopsis The Dream Machine by : M. Mitchell Waldrop

Download or read book The Dream Machine written by M. Mitchell Waldrop and published by Stripe Press. This book was released on 2018-09-25 with total page 583 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The story of the man who instigated the work that led to the internet—and shifted our understanding of what computers could be. Behind every great revolution is a vision and behind perhaps the greatest revolution of our time, personal computing, is the vision of J.C.R. Licklider. He did not design the first personal computers or write the software that ran on them, nor was he involved in the legendary early companies that brought them to the forefront of our everyday experience. He was instead a relentless visionary that saw the potential of the way individuals could interact with computers and software. At a time when computers were a short step removed from mechanical data processors, Licklider was writing treatises on "human-computer symbiosis", "computers as communication devices", and a now not-so-unfamiliar "Intergalactic Network." His ideas became so influential, his passion so contagious, that Waldrop called him "computing's Johnny Appleseed. In a simultaneously compelling personal narrative and comprehensive historical exposition, Waldrop tells the story of the man who not only instigated the work that led to the internet, but also shifted our understanding of what computers were and could be. Included in this edition are also the original texts of Licklider's three most influential writings: 'Man-computer symbiosis' (1960), which outlines the vision that inspired the personal computer revolution of the 1970s; his 'Intergalactic Network' memo (1963), which outlines the vision that inspired the internet; and "The computer as a communication device" (1968, co-authored with Robert Taylor), which amplifies his vision for what the network could become.

For Fun and Profit

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Author :
Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262551780
Total Pages : 335 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (625 download)

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Book Synopsis For Fun and Profit by : Christopher Tozzi

Download or read book For Fun and Profit written by Christopher Tozzi and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2024-04-09 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The free and open source software movement, from its origins in hacker culture, through the development of GNU and Linux, to its commercial use today. In the 1980s, there was a revolution with far-reaching consequences—a revolution to restore software freedom. In the early 1980s, after decades of making source code available with programs, most programmers ceased sharing code freely. A band of revolutionaries, self-described “hackers,” challenged this new norm by building operating systems with source code that could be freely shared. In For Fun and Profit, Christopher Tozzi offers an account of the free and open source software (FOSS) revolution, from its origins as an obscure, marginal effort by a small group of programmers to the widespread commercial use of open source software today. Tozzi explains FOSS's historical trajectory, shaped by eccentric personalities—including Richard Stallman and Linus Torvalds—and driven both by ideology and pragmatism, by fun and profit. Tozzi examines hacker culture and its influence on the Unix operating system, the reaction to Unix's commercialization, and the history of early Linux development. He describes the commercial boom that followed, when companies invested billions of dollars in products using FOSS operating systems; the subsequent tensions within the FOSS movement; and the battles with closed source software companies (especially Microsoft) that saw FOSS as a threat. Finally, Tozzi describes FOSS's current dominance in embedded computing, mobile devices, and the cloud, as well as its cultural and intellectual influence.