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ILLIAC IV
The ILLIAC IV was the first massively parallel computer. The system was originally designed to have 256 64-bit floating-point units (FPUs) and four central processing units (CPUs) able to process 1 billion operations per second. Due to budget constraints, only a single "quadrant" with 64 FPUs and a single CPU was built. Since the FPUs all processed the same instruction — etc. — in Flynn's taxonomy, the design would be considered to be single instruction, multiple data, or SIMD. The concept of building a computer using an array of processors came to Daniel Slotnick while working as a programmer on the IAS machine in 1952. A formal design did not start until 1960, when Slotnick was working at Westinghouse Electric Corporation and arranged development funding under a United States Air Force contract. When that funding ended in 1964, Slotnick moved to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and joined the Illinois Automatic Computer (ILLIAC) team. With funding from ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ILLIAC 4 Parallel Computer
ILLIAC (Illinois Automatic Computer) was a series of supercomputers built at a variety of locations, some at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. In all, five computers were built in this series between 1951 and 1974. Some more modern projects also use the name. Architectural blueprint The architecture for the first two UIUC computers was taken from a technical report from a committee at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) at Princeton, ''First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC'' (1945), edited by John von Neumann (but with ideas from Eckert, Mauchley, and many others.) The designs in this report were not tested at Princeton until a later machine, JOHNNIAC, was completed in 1953. However, the technical report was a major influence on computing in the 1950s, and was used as a blueprint for many other computers, including two at the University of Illinois, which were both completed before Princeton finished Johnniac. The University of Illinois was the only institution ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ARPANET
The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) was the first wide-area packet-switched network with distributed control and one of the first computer networks to implement the TCP/IP protocol suite. Both technologies became the technical foundation of the Internet. The ARPANET was established by the Advanced Research Projects Agency (now DARPA) of the United States Department of Defense. Building on the ideas of J. C. R. Licklider, Robert Taylor (computer scientist), Bob Taylor initiated the ARPANET project in 1966 to enable resource sharing between remote computers. Taylor appointed Lawrence Roberts (scientist), Larry Roberts as program manager. Roberts made the key decisions about the request for proposal to build the network. He incorporated Donald Davies' concepts and designs for packet switching, and sought input from Paul Baran on dynamic routing. In 1969, ARPA awarded the contract to build the Interface Message Processors (IMPs) for the network to Bolt Berane ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Doctor Of Philosophy
A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of Postgraduate education, graduate study and original research. The name of the degree is most often abbreviated PhD (or, at times, as Ph.D. in North American English, North America), pronounced as three separate letters ( ). The University of Oxford uses the alternative abbreviation "DPhil". PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Since it is an earned research degree, those studying for a PhD are required to produce original research that expands the boundaries of knowledge, normally in the form of a Thesis, dissertation, and, in some cases, defend their work before a panel of other experts in the field. In many fields, the completion of a PhD is typically required for employment as a university professor, researcher, or scientist. Definition In the context o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Von Neumann
John von Neumann ( ; ; December 28, 1903 – February 8, 1957) was a Hungarian and American mathematician, physicist, computer scientist and engineer. Von Neumann had perhaps the widest coverage of any mathematician of his time, integrating Basic research, pure and Applied science#Applied research, applied sciences and making major contributions to many fields, including mathematics, physics, economics, computing, and statistics. He was a pioneer in building the mathematical framework of quantum physics, in the development of functional analysis, and in game theory, introducing or codifying concepts including Cellular automaton, cellular automata, the Von Neumann universal constructor, universal constructor and the Computer, digital computer. His analysis of the structure of self-replication preceded the discovery of the structure of DNA. During World War II, von Neumann worked on the Manhattan Project. He developed the mathematical models behind the explosive lense ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Engineering Research Associates
Engineering Research Associates, commonly known as ERA, was a pioneering computer firm from the 1950s. ERA became famous for their numerical computers, but as the market expanded they became better known for their drum memory systems. They were eventually purchased by Remington Rand and merged into their UNIVAC department. Many of the company founders later left to form Control Data Corporation. Wartime origins of ERA The ERA team started as a group of scientists and engineers working for the US Navy during WWII on code-breaking, a division known as the Communications Supplementary Activity - Washington (CSAW). After the war budgets were cut for most military projects, including CSAW. Joseph Wenger of the Navy's cryptoanalytic group was particularly worried that the CSAW team would spread to various companies and the Navy would lose their ability to quickly design new machines. Post-war organization Wenger and two members of the CSAW team, William Norris and Howard Engst ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Drum Memory
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. Many early computers, called drum computers or drum machines, used drum memory as the main working memory of the computer. Some drums were also used as Auxiliary memory, secondary storage as for example various IBM_drum_storage, IBM drum storage drives and the UNIVAC FASTRAND series of drums. Drums were displaced as primary computer memory by magnetic core memory, which offered a better balance of size, speed, cost, reliability and potential for further improvements. Drums were then replaced by hard disk drives for secondary storage, which were both less expensive and offered denser storage. The manufacturing of drums ceased in the 1970s. Technical design A drum memory or drum storage unit contained a large metal cylinder, coated on the outside surface with a ferromagnetic recording material. It could be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Williams Tube
The Williams tube, or the Williams–Kilburn tube named after inventors Frederic Calland Williams, Freddie Williams and Tom Kilburn, is an early form of computer memory. It was the first Random-access memory, random-access digital storage device, and was used successfully in several early computers. The Williams tube works by displaying a grid of dots on a cathode-ray tube (CRT). Due to the way CRTs work, this creates a small charge of static electricity over each dot. The charge at the location of each of the dots is read by a thin metal sheet just in front of the display. Since the display faded over time, it was periodically refreshed. It operates faster than earlier Delay-line memory#Acoustic delay lines, acoustic delay-line memory, at the speed of the electrons inside the vacuum tube, rather than at the speed of sound. The system was adversely affected by nearby electrical fields, and required frequent adjustment to remain operational. Williams–Kilburn tubes were used pr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Word (computer Architecture)
In computing, a word is any processor design's natural unit of data. A word is a fixed-sized datum handled as a unit by the instruction set or the hardware of the processor. The number of bits or digits in a word (the ''word size'', ''word width'', or ''word length'') is an important characteristic of any specific processor design or computer architecture. The size of a word is reflected in many aspects of a computer's structure and operation; the majority of the registers in a processor are usually word-sized and the largest datum that can be transferred to and from the working memory in a single operation is a word in many (not all) architectures. The largest possible address size, used to designate a location in memory, is typically a hardware word (here, "hardware word" means the full-sized natural word of the processor, as opposed to any other definition used). Documentation for older computers with fixed word size commonly states memory sizes in words rather than bytes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. The institution moved to Newark, New Jersey, Newark in 1747 and then to its Mercer County, New Jersey, Mercer County campus in Princeton nine years later. It officially became a university in 1896 and was subsequently renamed Princeton University. The university is governed by the Trustees of Princeton University and has an endowment of $37.7 billion, the largest List of colleges and universities in the United States by endowment, endowment per student in the United States. Princeton provides undergraduate education, undergraduate and graduate education, graduate instruction in the hu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Institute For Advanced Study
The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry located in Princeton, New Jersey. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholars, including Albert Einstein, J. Robert Oppenheimer, Emmy Noether, Hermann Weyl, John von Neumann, Michael Walzer, Clifford Geertz and Kurt Gödel, many of whom had emigrated from Europe to the United States. It was founded in 1930 by American educator Abraham Flexner, together with philanthropists Louis Bamberger and Caroline Bamberger Fuld. Despite collaborative ties and neighboring geographic location, the institute, being independent, has "no formal links" with Princeton University. The institute does not charge tuition or fees. Flexner's guiding principle in founding the institute was the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake.Jogalekar. The faculty have no classes to teach. There are no degree programs or experimental facilities at the institute. Research ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Logic Gate
A logic gate is a device that performs a Boolean function, a logical operation performed on one or more binary inputs that produces a single binary output. Depending on the context, the term may refer to an ideal logic gate, one that has, for instance, zero rise time and unlimited fan-out, or it may refer to a non-ideal physical device (see ideal and real op-amps for comparison). The primary way of building logic gates uses diodes or transistors acting as electronic switches. Today, most logic gates are made from MOSFETs (metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistors). ''From Integrated circuit'' They can also be constructed using vacuum tubes, electromagnetic relays with relay logic, fluidic logic, pneumatic logic, optics, molecules, acoustics, or even mechanical or thermal elements. Logic gates can be cascaded in the same way that Boolean functions can be composed, allowing the construction of a physical model of all of Boolean logic, and therefore, all o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Integrated Circuit
An integrated circuit (IC), also known as a microchip or simply chip, is a set of electronic circuits, consisting of various electronic components (such as transistors, resistors, and capacitors) and their interconnections. These components are etched onto a small, flat piece ("chip") of semiconductor material, usually silicon. Integrated circuits are used in a wide range of electronic devices, including computers, smartphones, and televisions, to perform various functions such as processing and storing information. They have greatly impacted the field of electronics by enabling device miniaturization and enhanced functionality. Integrated circuits are orders of magnitude smaller, faster, and less expensive than those constructed of discrete components, allowing a large transistor count. The IC's mass production capability, reliability, and building-block approach to integrated circuit design have ensured the rapid adoption of standardized ICs in place of designs using discre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
