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Beginnings |
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The history of computing began with an analog machine. In 1623 German scientist Wilhelm Schikard invented a machine that used 11 complete and 6 incomplete sprocketed wheels that could add, and with the aid of logarithm tables, multiply and divide. French philosopher, mathematician, and physicist Blaise Pascal invented a machine in 1642 that added and subtracted, automatically carrying and borrowing digits from column to column. Pascal built 50 copies of his machine, but most served as curiosities in parlors of the wealthy. Seventeenth-century German mathematician Gottfried Leibniz designed a special gearing system to enable multiplication on Pascal’s machine. |
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