The Harvard Mark IV was an electronic
stored-program computer
A stored-program computer is a computer that stores program instructions in electronically or optically accessible memory. This contrasts with systems that stored the program instructions with plugboards or similar mechanisms.
The definition i ...
built by
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
under the supervision of
Howard Aiken
Howard Hathaway Aiken (March 8, 1900 – March 14, 1973) was an American physicist and a pioneer in computing, being the original conceptual designer behind IBM's Harvard Mark I computer.
Biography
Aiken studied at the University of Wisconsin ...
for the
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...
. The computer was finished being built in 1952.
It stayed at Harvard, where the Air Force used it extensively.
The Mark IV was all
electronic
Electronic may refer to:
*Electronics, the science of how to control electric energy in semiconductor
* ''Electronics'' (magazine), a defunct American trade journal
*Electronic storage, the storage of data using an electronic device
*Electronic co ...
. The Mark IV used
magnetic drum
Drum memory was a magnetic data storage device invented by Gustav Tauschek in 1932 in Austria. Drums were widely used in the 1950s and into the 1960s as computer memory.
For many early computers, drum memory formed the main working memory ...
and had 200 registers of
ferrite magnetic-core memory
Magnetic-core memory was the predominant form of random access, random-access computer memory for 20 years between about 1955 and 1975.
Such memory is often just called core memory, or, informally, core.
Core memory uses toroids (rings) of a ...
(one of the first computers to do so). It separated the storage of data and instructions in what is known as the
Harvard architecture
The Harvard architecture is a computer architecture with separate storage and signal pathways for instructions and data. It contrasts with the von Neumann architecture, where program instructions and data share the same memory and pathways.
...
.
See also
*
Harvard Mark I
The Harvard Mark I, or IBM Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator (ASCC), was a general-purpose electromechanical computer used in the war effort during the last part of World War II.
One of the first programs to run on the Mark I was initi ...
*
Harvard Mark II
The Harvard Mark II, also known as the Aiken Relay Calculator, was an electromechanical computer built under the direction of Howard Aiken at Harvard University, completed in 1947. It was financed by the United States Navy and used for ballistic c ...
*
Harvard Mark III
The Harvard Mark III, also known as ADEC (for Aiken Dahlgren Electronic Calculator) was an early computer that was partially electronic and partially electromechanical. It was built at Harvard University under the supervision of Howard Aiken for ...
*
List of vacuum tube computers
Vacuum-tube computers, now called first-generation computers, are programmable digital computers using vacuum-tube logic circuitry. They were preceded by systems using electromechanical relays and followed by systems built from discrete transis ...
*
Howard Aiken
Howard Hathaway Aiken (March 8, 1900 – March 14, 1973) was an American physicist and a pioneer in computing, being the original conceptual designer behind IBM's Harvard Mark I computer.
Biography
Aiken studied at the University of Wisconsin ...
*
Harvard
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
(World War II advanced trainer aircraft)
References
Further reading
*''A History of Computing Technology'', Michael R. Williams, 1997,
IEEE Computer Society Press
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is a 501(c)(3) professional association for electronic engineering and electrical engineering (and associated disciplines) with its corporate office in New York City and its operation ...
,
External links
Harvard Mark IV 64-bit Magnetic Shift Registerat ComputerHistory.org
1950s computers
Computer-related introductions in 1952
Vacuum tube computers
One-of-a-kind computers
Harvard University
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