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Steve Vickers (computer Scientist)
Steve Vickers (born 1952 or 1953) is a British mathematician and computer scientist. In the early 1980s, he wrote ROM firmware and manuals for three home computers, the ZX81, ZX Spectrum, and Jupiter Ace. The latter was produced by Jupiter Cantab, a short-lived company Vickers formed together with Richard Altwasser, after the two had left Sinclair Research. Since the late 1980s, Vickers has been an academic in the field of geometric logic, writing over 30 papers in scholarly journals on mathematical aspects of computer science. His book ''Topology via Logic'' has been influential over a range of fields (extending even to theoretical physics, where Christopher Isham of Imperial College London has cited Vickers as an early influence on his work on topoi and quantum gravity). In October 2018, he retired as senior lecturer at the University of Birmingham. As announced on his university homepage, he continues to supervise PhD students at the university and focus on his research. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Computer Science
Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, applied disciplines (including the design and implementation of Computer architecture, hardware and Software engineering, software). Algorithms and data structures are central to computer science. The theory of computation concerns abstract models of computation and general classes of computational problem, problems that can be solved using them. The fields of cryptography and computer security involve studying the means for secure communication and preventing security vulnerabilities. Computer graphics (computer science), Computer graphics and computational geometry address the generation of images. Programming language theory considers different ways to describe computational processes, and database theory concerns the management of re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Department Of Computing, Imperial College London
The Department of Computing (DoC) is the computer science department at Imperial College London. The department has around 50 academic staff and 1000 students, with around 600 studying undergraduate courses, 200 PhD students, and 200 MSc students. The department is predominantly based in the Huxley Building, 180 Queen's Gate, which it shares with the Maths department, however also has space in the William Penney Laboratory and in the Aeronautics and Chemical Engineering Extension. The department ranks 7th in the Times Higher Education 2020 subject world rankings. History The origins of the department start with the formation of the Computer Unit in 1964, led by Stanley Gill, out of the Department of Electrical Engineering. However, earlier work had also been done by the Department of Mathematics, which had built the Imperial College Computing Engine, an early digital relay computer. In 1966, the postgraduate Centre for Computing and Automation came into being and consumed th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jupiter ACE
The Jupiter Ace by Jupiter Cantab was a British home computer released in 1982. The Ace differed from other microcomputers of the time in that its programming environment used Forth instead of the more popular BASIC. This difference, along with limited available software and poor character based graphic display, limited sales and the machine was not a success. History Jupiter Cantab was formed by Richard Altwasser and Steven Vickers. Both had been on the design team for the ZX Spectrum: Altwasser worked on ZX81 development and hardware design of the Spectrum. Vickers adapted and expanded the 4K ZX80 ROM to the 8K ZX81 ROM and wrote most of the ROM for the Spectrum. The Jupiter Ace was named after an early British computer from 1950: the Pilot ACE. The Jupiter Ace went on sale on 22 September 1982 with a price of £89.95. Sales to the general public were slow. Initially the computer was only available by mail order, and Jupiter Cantab reported that there were produc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ZX80
The Sinclair ZX80 is a home computer launched on 29 January 1980 by Science of Cambridge Ltd. (later to be better known as Sinclair Research). It is notable for being one of the first computers available in the United Kingdom for less than a hundred pounds. It was available in kit form for £79.95, where purchasers had to assemble and solder it together, and as a ready-built version at £99.95. The ZX80 was advertised as the first personal computer for under £100 and received praise for its value and documentation. However, it faced criticism for screen blanking during program execution, small RAM size, and the keyboard design. It was very popular straight away, and for some time there was a waiting list of several months for either version of the machine. Name The ZX80 was named after the Z80 processor with the 'X' meaning "the mystery ingredient". Hardware Internally, the machine was designed by Jim Westwood around a Z80 central processing unit with a clock speed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sinclair BASIC
Sinclair BASIC is a dialect of the programming language BASIC used in the 8-bit home computers from Sinclair Research, Timex Sinclair and Amstrad. The Sinclair BASIC interpreter was written by Nine Tiles Networks Ltd. Designed to run in only 1 KB of RAM, the system makes a number of decisions to lower memory usage. This led to one of Sinclair BASIC's most notable features, that the keywords were entered using single keystrokes; each of the possible keywords was mapped to a key on the keyboard, when pressed, the token would be placed into memory while the entire keyword was printed out on-screen. This made code entry easier whilst simplifying the parser. The original ZX80 version supported only integer mathematics, which partially made up for some of the memory-saving design notes which had negative impact on performance. When the system was ported to the ZX81 in 1981, a full floating point implementation was added. This version was very slow, among the slowest BASICs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Leeds University
The University of Leeds is a public research university in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It was established in 1874 as the Yorkshire College of Science. In 1884, it merged with the Leeds School of Medicine (established 1831) and was renamed Yorkshire College. It became part of the federal Victoria University in 1887, joining Owens College (which became the University of Manchester) and University College Liverpool (which became the University of Liverpool).Charlton, H. B. (1951) ''Portrait of a University''. Manchester: U. P.; chap. IV In 1904, a royal charter was granted to the University of Leeds by King Edward VII. Leeds is the tenth-largest university in the United Kingdom by total enrolment and receives over 68,000 undergraduate applications per year, making it the fourth-most popular university (behind Manchester, University College London and King's College London) in the UK by volume of applications. Leeds had an income of £1.05 billion in 2023–24, of which ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
King's College, Cambridge
King's College, formally The King's College of Our Lady and Saint Nicholas in Cambridge, is a List of colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college lies beside the River Cam and faces out onto King's Parade in the centre of the city. King's was founded in 1441 by King Henry VI of England, Henry VI soon after founding its sister institution, Eton College. Initially, King's accepted only students from Eton College. However, the king's plans for King's College were disrupted by the Wars of the Roses and the resultant scarcity of funds, and then his eventual deposition. Little progress was made on the project until 1508, when King Henry VII of England, Henry VII began to take an interest in the college, probably as a political move to legitimise his new position. The building of the college's chapel began in 1446, and was finished in 1544 during the reign of Henry VIII. King's College Chapel, Cambridge, King's College Chap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quantum Gravity
Quantum gravity (QG) is a field of theoretical physics that seeks to describe gravity according to the principles of quantum mechanics. It deals with environments in which neither gravitational nor quantum effects can be ignored, such as in the vicinity of black holes or similar compact astrophysical objects, as well as in the early stages of the universe moments after the Big Bang. Three of the four fundamental forces of nature are described within the framework of quantum mechanics and quantum field theory: the Electromagnetism, electromagnetic interaction, the Strong interaction, strong force, and the Weak interaction, weak force; this leaves gravity as the only interaction that has not been fully accommodated. The current understanding of gravity is based on Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity, which incorporates his theory of special relativity and deeply modifies the understanding of concepts like time and space. Although general relativity is highly regarded for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Topoi
In mathematics, a topos (, ; plural topoi or , or toposes) is a category that behaves like the category of sheaves of sets on a topological space (or more generally, on a site). Topoi behave much like the category of sets and possess a notion of localization. The Grothendieck topoi find applications in algebraic geometry, and more general elementary topoi are used in logic. The mathematical field that studies topoi is called topos theory. Grothendieck topos (topos in geometry) Since the introduction of sheaves into mathematics in the 1940s, a major theme has been to study a space by studying sheaves on a space. This idea was expounded by Alexander Grothendieck by introducing the notion of a "topos". The main utility of this notion is in the abundance of situations in mathematics where topological heuristics are very effective, but an honest topological space is lacking; it is sometimes possible to find a topos formalizing the heuristic. An important example of this programma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christopher Isham
Christopher Isham (; born 28 April 1944), usually cited as Chris J. Isham, is a theoretical physicist at Imperial College London. Research Isham's main research interests are quantum gravity and foundational studies in quantum theory. He was the inventor of an approach to temporal quantum logic called the HPO formalism, and has worked on loop quantum gravity and quantum geometrodynamics. Together with other physicists, such as John C. Baez, Isham is known as a proponent of the utility of category theory in theoretical physics. In recent years, since at least 1997, he has been working on a new approach to quantum theory based on topos theory. He is the author of ''Modern differential geometry for physicists'', first published in 1989. Isham has appeared in several '' NOVA'' television programmes as well as a film about Stephen Hawking. Physicist Paul Davies has described Isham as "Britain's greatest quantum gravity expert". As a practising Christian, Isham has also writte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Theoretical Physics
Theoretical physics is a branch of physics that employs mathematical models and abstractions of physical objects and systems to rationalize, explain, and predict List of natural phenomena, natural phenomena. This is in contrast to experimental physics, which uses experimental tools to probe these phenomena. The advancement of science generally depends on the interplay between experimental studies and theory. In some cases, theoretical physics adheres to standards of mathematical rigour while giving little weight to experiments and observations.There is some debate as to whether or not theoretical physics uses mathematics to build intuition and illustrativeness to extract physical insight (especially when normal experience fails), rather than as a tool in formalizing theories. This links to the question of it using mathematics in a less formally rigorous, and more intuitive or heuristic way than, say, mathematical physics. For example, while developing special relativity, Albert E ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
