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Timeline of Computer Science History Compiled by Alex Cosper The earliest concept that shaped computer science was the abacus, a device for mathematical calculations. Typically made of wood and sliding beads on strings, wood or wires, the device goes back many centuries across multiple cultures. It traces as early back to 2300 BC in Mesopotamian culture. The word computer referred to a person who calculates until the 20th century, when the term became associated with machines. In 1642 Blaise Pascal invented a calculator that could add, subtract and divide that he called the Pascaline. 1801 - Joseph-Marie Masquard introduces punch cards, used for piano rolls 1816 - Francis Ronalds of England invents an early telegraph 1820 - Charles Xavier Thomas de Colmar develops the first mass produced calculator based on punch cards 1825 - William Sturgeon invents the electromagnet, a magnet driven my electric current 1832 - Baron Schilling von Canstatt develops a telegraph with a keyboard 1835 - Charles Babbage invents an "analytic engine" based on punched cards and a steam engine 1836 - Samuel Morse and partners design the Morse Code communication system 1847 - Alexander Bain explains a device idea in which a paper roll can determine notes to play on a pipe organ 1867 - American Van Dusen secures a US patent that describes a pneumatic striker powered by a roll. 1873 - Schmoele brothers win patent for a double valve pneumatic amplifier, with electromagnet to read piano rolls 1874 - First commercial typewriters sold, but the product takes a decade to become widespread with businesses 1884 - The National Cash Register company is established following acquisitions by John H. Patterson 1885 - Julius E. Pitrat is awarded a patent for the computer scale 1888 - Alexander Dey invents the dial recorder 1889 - Herman Hollerith wins patent for the Electric Tabulating Machine 1889 - William Bundy introduces an employee timeclock/punch card machine 1897 - Thaddeus Cahill pipes music over phone lines to New York businesses 1901 - The Metrostyle popularizes player pianos powered by paper rolls, representing early automation 1906 - Xerox is founded as the Haloid Photographic Company, which manufactures photographic paper and equipment 1911 - The Computer-Tabulating-Recording (CTR) Company launches 1920 - Player pianos, which represented about half of piano sales, begin to peak early in the decade 1924 - CTR changes its name to IBM 1933 - The Mallock Machine at Cambridge University solves simultaneous linear differential equations 1934 - Hammond tonewheel organ invention marks the beginning of electronic organs 1936 - Water integrator, designed by Vladimir Lukyanov, stores numbers and calculates based on water levels 1936 - Konrad Zuse develops the first freely programmable computer 1937 - George Robert Stibitz introduces the first electric digital computer, the Model K 1939 - Stanford graduates William Hewlett and David Packard launch HP, developing an oscillator 1943 - Tommy Flowers begins building WWII British codebreaking computer called Colossus 1945 - William Shockley at Bell Labs begins work on the transistor to replace vacuum tubes 1946 - John Machly and J. Presper Eckert introduce the first electronic general-purpose computer called ENIAC 1946 - Alan Turing presents paper about the first program-stored computer while working on his ACE project 1946 - University of Manchester scientists design first stored-program computer called SSEM 1947 - Bell Labs introduces the transistor, the foundation of computer chips 1949 - CSIRAC is the first computer to play digital music, developed by Trevor Pearcey and Maston Beard 1949 - The MONIAC hydraulic computer is developed by Bill Phillips in the UK 1951 - UNIVAC I, developed by John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert, marks the beginning of commercial computers 1951 - Texas Instruments (TI) is established and introduces the first silicon transistor 1952 - Geoffrey Dummer develops the concept of the integrated circuit 1953 - IBM introduces its 702 model, the first magnetic tape computer 1953 - The IBM 650 becomes the first mass produced computer 1954 - TI introduces the first transistor radios 1954 - IBM designs SAGE for the US Air Force to track radar data in real time 1954 - IBM develops early computer programming language Fortran, based on mathematics 1958 - Jack Kilby of TI demonstrates the first integrated circuit 1959 - Xerox introduces the 914 photocopier, developed by Chester Carlson 1959 - The US Department of Defense begins planning on COBOL project as a programming language for business 1962 - IBM announces that COBOL will be its primary programming language 1964 - The IBM System/360 mainframe marks the first computer system family, introducing upgrades 1964 - Developers John G. Kearney and Thomas E. Kurtz introduce the original BASIC programming language 1965 - Robert Moore writes about "Moore's Law," which predicts how components grow in semiconductors over time 1967 - TI introduces the first hand-held calculator 1968 - Intel is founded by Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore as a semiconductor company 1969 - ARPANET's pubic debut marks the beginning of the internet era 1970 - The IBM System/370 mainframe is introduced 1970 - MIT, Bell Labs and GE begin collaborating on the development of the Unix operating system 1972 - Atari is founded by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney for developing arcade and video games 1972 - Development begins on the C programming language by Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Labs 1972 - Sacramento State developers under Bill Pentz build the 8-bit "8008" processor for Intel 1973 - Xerox introduces the first color copier, the 6500 1973 - Gary Kildall develops programming language for microcomputers called PL/M and CP/M for the Intel 8080 1974 - IBM develops the Universal Product Code 1974 - MIT introduces early PC, the Altair 8800 microprocessor, sold through mail order as a build-it-yourself kit 1975 - Microsoft is founded by Paul Allen and Bill Gates as a computer software company 1976 - Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak launch Apple as a developer of personal computer kits 1976 - Apple introduces the Apple I personal computer 1976 - Cray-1 supercomputer built by Seymour Cray and Lester Davis 1977 - Apple introduces the Apple II personal computer 1979 - Larry Ellison introduces the first Oracle Database 1979 - "C with Classes" is developed by Bjarne Stroustrup as an extension to the C programming language 1980 - IBM and Microsoft establish a relationship to market MS-DOS operating system for IBM's PC 1981 - IBM develops its Model 5150 persona computer 1982 - Adobe Systems is founded by John Warnock and Charles Geschke, offering publishing and font software 1983 - A two-year recession begins in the video game industry known as "the video game crash of 1983" 1983 - Gary Kildall begins co-hosting a PBS TV show called Computer Chronicles 1986 - XeroxPARC invents "switchable desktops" as an early form of virtual desktops 1986 - Sybase is founded to market relational database software 1984 - Apple introduces the Mac on a Super Bowl commercial, based on Xerox-PARC graphics technology 1984 - Revenge of the Nerds film is a summer blockbuster 1984 - Cisco Systems is founded by Stanford scientists Leonard Bosack and Sandy Lerner for networking solutions 1984 - Michael Dell founds Dell computer company 1985 - The first version of C++ (formerly called C with Classes) is released 1985 - A year after resigning from Apple, Steve Jobs launches NeXT Inc. 1985 - Microsoft introduces its Windows operating system based on MS-DOS 1985 - Aldus introduces PageMaker desktop publishing software for Mac 1987 - Sybase introduces its SQL server 1987 - TI develops the digital light processing (DLP) chip 1989 - Adobe introduces PhotoShop for Mac 1989 - Tim Berners Lee of CERN begins work on developing the World Wide Web 1990 - Microsoft introduces its Office software suite including Word and Excel 1990 - TI introduces the TI-81, the first graphing calculator 1991 - Adobe introduces Premiere video-editing software 1991 - Java is developed by James Gosling, originally for interactive television 1993 - Adobe introduces the PDF format along with Acrobat and Reader software 1993 - NCSA releases its Mosaic for Windows as an early web browser 1994 - Adobe acquires PageMaker from Aldus 1994 - Yahoo is founded by Jerry Yang and David Filo 1994 - PC software pioneer Gary Kildall dies at age 52 1995 - Sun Microsystems releases Java 1.0 1996 - Apple announces its purchase of NeXT 1997 - Steve Jobs returns to Apple as CEO 1998 - Google is founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin 1999 - Salesforce.com is founded as a company selling sales automation software 1999 - VMWare is established and releases it first virtualized workstation solution 2001 - Apple releases its Mac OS X software 2001 - Apple introduces the iPod and the iTunes Music Player 2003 - Apple introduces the iTunes Music Store 2004 - Broadband technology is widely adopted for high speed internet connections 2005 - IBM sells its PC business to Lenovo 2005 - Google acquires the Android operating system 2006 - Amazon introduces its cloud computing platform 2007 - Apple iPhone revolutionizes smartphones 2007 - Google founds the Open Handset Alliance consortium to develop hardware and software 2008 - Apple's App Store opens, selling about 500 apps 2008 - Google introduces its first Android device 2010 - Microsoft introduces its Windows Azure cloud platform 2011 - IBM unveils its artificial intelligence system Watson 2011 - Steve Jobs dies at the age of 56 2013 - Google launches its Compute Engine cloud platform
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