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Société D'électronique Et D'automatisme
The Société d'électronique et d'automatisme (SEA) was an early French computer manufacturer established in 1947 by electrical engineer François-Henri Raymond, which designed and put into operation a significant portion of the first computers in France during the 1950s. The SEA played a major role in driving the development of the French computer industry, training the first generation of engineers and installing about 170 computers between 1955 and its dissolution in 1966, when it merged with Compagnie internationale pour l'informatique, CII. History and achievements In 1947, François-Henri Raymond is sent for a technical trip to the United States where he meets Howard H. Aiken at Harvard University, visits the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT laboratories and comes across John von Neumann's First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC, report on the EDVAC and the pioneering concepts of a then futuristic machine: the stored-program computer. Upon returning to Paris, he sh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Compagnie Internationale Pour L'informatique
Plan Calcul was a French governmental program to promote a national or European computer industry and associated research and education activities. History The plan was approved in July 1966 by President Charles de Gaulle, in the aftermath of two key events that made his government worry about French dependence on the US computer industry. In the mid-1960s, the United States denied export licenses for American-made IBM and Control Data Corporation, CDC computers to the French Commissariat à l'énergie atomique in order to prevent it from perfecting its H bomb. Meanwhile, in 1964, General Electric had acquired a majority of Groupe Bull, Compagnie des Machines Bull, the largest French computer manufacturer, which had the second highest market share in France, after IBM, and was a leading IT equipment maker in Europe. Following this partial takeover, known as "Affaire Bull", GE-Bull dropped two Bull computers from its product line. Responsibility for administering the plan was given ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diode Logic
Diode logic (or diode-resistor logic) constructs And (logic), AND and Or (logic), OR logic gates with diodes and Resistor, resistors. An active device (vacuum tubes with control grids in History of computing hardware, early electronic computers, then transistors in diode–transistor logic) is additionally required to provide Inverter (logic gate), logical inversion (NOT) for functional completeness and Amplifier, amplification for voltage ''level restoration'', which diode logic alone can't provide. Since voltage levels weaken with each diode logic stage, multiple stages can't easily be cascaded, limiting diode logic's usefulness. However, diode logic has the advantage of utilizing only cheap passive components. Background Logic gates Logic gates evaluate Boolean algebra, typically using electronic switches controlled by logical inputs connected in Series and parallel circuits, parallel or series. Diode logic can ''only'' implement OR and AND, because Inverter (logic gate), ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
IBM 1401
The IBM 1401 is a variable word length computer, variable-wordlength decimal computer that was announced by IBM on October 5, 1959. The first member of the highly successful IBM 1400 series, it was aimed at replacing unit record equipment for processing data stored on punched cards and at providing peripheral services for larger computers. The 1401 is considered by IBM to be the Ford Model T, Ford Model-T of the computer industry due to its mass appeal. Over 12,000 units were produced and many were leased or resold after they were replaced with newer technology. The 1401 was withdrawn on February 8, 1971. History The 1401 project evolved from an IBM project named "World Wide Accounting Machine" (WWAM), which in turn was a reaction to the success of the Bull Gamma 3. The 1401 was used as an independent system in conjunction with IBM punched card equipment. It was also operated as auxiliary equipment to IBM 700/7000 series, IBM 700 or 7000 series systems. Monthly rental for 140 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crédit Lyonnais
The Crédit Lyonnais (, "Lyon Credit ompany) was a major French bank, created in 1863 and absorbed by former rival Crédit Agricole in 2003. Its head office was initially in Lyon but moved to Paris in 1882. In the early years of the 20th century, it was the world's largest bank by total assets. Its former French retail network survives as LCL S.A., a fully owned subsidiary of Crédit Agricole, under the brand LCL adopted in 2005 with reference to "Le Crédit Lyonnais". History 19th century The creation of Crédit Lyonnais was favored by French legislation of that liberalized the creation of joint-stock companies without prior government authorization. The bank was chartered on by Henri Germain, who was the largest shareholder with 5.4 percent of equity capital and became its first chairman. Prominent promoters of Saint-Simonianism initially participated in the venture, namely François Barthélemy Arlès-Dufour who was instrumental in convincing Germain to initiate t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Magnetic-core Memory
In computing, magnetic-core memory is a form of random-access memory. It predominated for roughly 20 years between 1955 and 1975, and is often just called core memory, or, informally, core. Core memory uses toroids (rings) of a hard magnetic material (usually a Ferrite (magnet)#Semi-hard ferrites, semi-hard ferrite). Each core stores one bit of information. Two or more wires pass through each core, forming an X-Y array of cores. When an electrical current above a certain threshold is applied to the wires, the core will become magnetized. The core to be assigned a value – or ''written'' – is selected by powering one X and one Y wire to half of the required current, such that only the single core at the intersection is written. Depending on the direction of the currents, the core will pick up a clockwise or counterclockwise magnetic field, storing a 1 or 0. This writing process also causes electricity to be electromagnetic induction, induced into nearby wires. If t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
CAB 500
The CAB 500 (''Calculatrice Automatique Binaire'' ''500'', or Binary Automatic Calculator 500) was a transistorized computer using drum memory designed between 1957-1959 by Société d'électronique et d'automatisme, Société d'Electronique et d'Automatisme (SEA) and manufactured in about a hundred units, with the first one delivered in 1961. It was predominantly distributed in Europe, with a few exemples also being sold in China and Japan. In Japan, it had a distinct market presence through the Yaskawa Electric Corporation, Yaskawa Electrics Corporation, which held a licensing agreement with SEA. The CAB 500 featured a novel micro-programmed architecture which used transistors and magnetic amplifiers for its logic called symmags, developed by SEA. It also ran an interactive High-level programming language, high-level language for real-time calculations, one of the first of its kind, and an incremental compiler for a programming language known as PAF, which bore resemblance to Fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Magnetic Logic
Magnetic logic is digital logic made using the non-linear properties of wound ferrite cores. Magnetic logic represents 0 and 1 by magnetising cores clockwise or anticlockwise.MAGNETIC CORES - PART I - PROPERTIES - Department of Defense 1962 - PIN 28374 - PROPERTIES OF MAGNETIC CORES AND THEIR APPLICATION IN DATA PROCESSING SYSTEM; HOW INFORMATION IS STORED AND TRANSFERRED FROM ONE CORE TO ANOTHER. Examples of magnetic logic include core memory. Also, AND, OR, NOT and clocked shift logic gates can be constructed using appropriate windings, and the use of diodes. A complete computer called the ALWAC 800 was constructed using magnetic logic, but it was not commercially successful. The Elliott 803 computer used a combination of magnetic cores (for logic function) and germanium transistors (as pulse amplifiers) for its CPU. It was a commercial success. William F. Steagall of the Sperry-Rand corporation developed the technology in an effort to improve the reliability of computers. In ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Compagnie Des Machines Bull
Bull SAS (also known as Groupe Bull, Bull Information Systems, or simply Bull) is a French computer company headquartered in Les Clayes-sous-Bois, in the western suburbs of Paris. The company has also been known at various times as Bull General Electric, Honeywell Bull, CII Honeywell Bull, and Bull HN. Bull was founded in 1931, as H.W. Egli - Bull, to capitalize on the punched card technology patents of Norwegian engineer Fredrik Rosing Bull (1882–1925). After a reorganization in 1933, with new investors coming in, the name was changed to Compagnie des Machines Bull (CMB). Bull has a worldwide presence in more than 100 countries and is particularly active in the defense, finance, health care, manufacturing, public, and telecommunication sectors. History Origins On 31 July 1919, Norwegian engineer Fredrik Rosing Bull filed a patent for a "combined sorter-recorder-tabulator of punch cards" machine that he had developed with financing from the Norwegian insurance company ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bull Gamma 3
The Gamma 3 was an early electronic vacuum-tube computer. It was designed by Compagnie des Machines Bull in Paris, France and released in 1952. Originally designed as an electronic accelerator for electromechanical tabulating machines, similar to the IBM 604, it was gradually enhanced with new features and evolved into a first-generation stored program computer (Gamma AET, 1955, then ET, 1957). In its stored-program configurations, the Gamma 3 mostly competed with the IBM 650. Over the course of its ten-year availability, this machine facilitated the transition from electromechanical unit records equipment to computers. The Gamma 3 was a commercial success, eventually selling more than 1200 units and prompting IBM to release the 1401 as a competitor. The Gamma 3 was succeeded by the lower-end Gamma 10, the mid-range Gamma 30, and the large, high-end Gamma 60 mainframe. History Until the 1950s, Compagnie des Machines Bull, like its rival IBM, primarily marketed punched car ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Directorate-General For External Security
The Directorate-General for External Security (, , DGSE) is France's foreign intelligence agency, equivalent to the British MI6 and the American CIA, established on 27 November 1943. The DGSE safeguards French national security through intelligence gathering and conducting paramilitary and counterintelligence operations abroad, as well as economic espionage. The service is currently headquartered in the 20th arrondissement of Paris, but construction has begun on a new headquarters at Fort Neuf de Vincennes, in Vincennes, on the eastern edge of Paris. The DGSE operates under the direction of the French Ministry of Armed Forces and works alongside its domestic counterpart, the DGSI (General Directorate for Internal Security). As with most other intelligence agencies, details of its operations and organization are classified and not made public. The DGSE follows a system which it refers to as LEDA. L stands for loyalty (loyauté), E stands for elevated standards (exigence) ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
