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BESK (''Binär Elektronisk SekvensKalkylator'',
Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
for "Binary Electronic Sequence Calculator") was
Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
's first electronic
computer A computer is a machine that can be programmed to Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as C ...
, using
vacuum tube A vacuum tube, electron tube, valve (British usage), or tube (North America), is a device that controls electric current flow in a high vacuum between electrodes to which an electric voltage, potential difference has been applied. The type kn ...
s instead of
relay A relay Electromechanical relay schematic showing a control coil, four pairs of normally open and one pair of normally closed contacts An automotive-style miniature relay with the dust cover taken off A relay is an electrically operated switch ...
s. It was developed by '' Matematikmaskinnämnden'' ( Swedish Board for Computing Machinery) and for a short time it was the fastest computer in the world. The computer was completed in 1953 and in use until 1966. The technology behind BESK was later continued with the
transistor upright=1.4, gate (G), body (B), source (S) and drain (D) terminals. The gate is separated from the body by an insulating layer (pink). A transistor is a semiconductor device used to Electronic amplifier, amplify or electronic switch, switch e ...
ized FACIT EDB and FACIT EDB-3 machines, both software compatible with BESK. Non-compatible machines highly inspired by BESK were SMIL made for the University of Lund, ''SAABs räkneautomat''
SARA Sara may refer to: Arts, media and entertainment Film and television * ''Sara'' (1992 film), 1992 Iranian film by Dariush Merhjui * ''Sara'' (1997 film), 1997 Polish film starring Bogusław Linda * ''Sara'' (2010 film), 2010 Sri Lankan Sinhal ...
, "SAAB's calculating machine", and DASK made in
Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark ...
. BESK was developed by the Swedish Board for Computing Machinery (Matematikmaskinnämnden) a few years after the mechanical relay computer
BARK Bark may refer to: * Bark (botany), an outer layer of a woody plant such as a tree or stick * Bark (sound), a vocalization of some animals (which is commonly the dog) Places * Bark, Germany * Bark, Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, Poland Arts, ...
(Binär Aritmetisk Relä-Kalkylator, Swedish for "Binary Arithmetic Relay Calculator"). The team was initially led by
Conny Palm Conrad "Conny" Palm (1907–1951) was a Swedish electrical engineer and statistician, known for several contributions to teletraffic engineering and queueing theory. Rolf B. HaugenThe life and work of Conny Palm – some personal comments and ex ...
, who died in December 1951, after which Stig Comét took over. The hardware was developed by Erik Stemme. Gösta Neovius and
Olle Karlqvist Olov (or Olof) is a Swedish form of Olav/Olaf, meaning "ancestor's descendant". A common short form of the name is ''Olle''. The name may refer to: *Per-Olov Ahrén (1926–2004), Swedish clergyman, bishop of Lund from 1980 to 1992 *Per-Olov Bra ...
were responsible for architecture and instruction set. It was closely modeled on the IAS machine for which the design team had retrieved drawings during a scholarship to Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) and
Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...
, U.S. During the development of the BESK magnetic drum memory,
Olle Karlqvist Olov (or Olof) is a Swedish form of Olav/Olaf, meaning "ancestor's descendant". A common short form of the name is ''Olle''. The name may refer to: *Per-Olov Ahrén (1926–2004), Swedish clergyman, bishop of Lund from 1980 to 1992 *Per-Olov Bra ...
discovered a magnetic phenomenon, which has been called the Karlqvist gap.


Performance

BESK was a 40-bit machine; it could perform an addition in 56 μs and a multiplication took 350 μs. The
electrostatic Electrostatics is a branch of physics that studies electric charges at rest (static electricity). Since classical times, it has been known that some materials, such as amber, attract lightweight particles after rubbing. The Greek word for amber ...
memory could store 512 words. The instruction length was 20 bits, so each word could store two instructions. BESK contained 2400 "radio tubes" (
vacuum tube A vacuum tube, electron tube, valve (British usage), or tube (North America), is a device that controls electric current flow in a high vacuum between electrodes to which an electric voltage, potential difference has been applied. The type kn ...
s) and 400
germanium Germanium is a chemical element with the symbol Ge and atomic number 32. It is lustrous, hard-brittle, grayish-white and similar in appearance to silicon. It is a metalloid in the carbon group that is chemically similar to its group neighbors s ...
diode A diode is a two-terminal electronic component that conducts current primarily in one direction (asymmetric conductance); it has low (ideally zero) resistance in one direction, and high (ideally infinite) resistance in the other. A diode ...
s (so it was partly solid state). The power consumption was 15 kVA. Initially an average runtime of 5 minutes was achieved before hardware problems appeared. In 1954 the system became more stable. Breakpoints were introduced to allow software restart after hardware failures. Originally BESK had a British Williams tube 512 word x 40 bit memory based on 40 cathode tubes, and eight spare tubes. The memory was from the beginning found to be insufficient and Carl-Ivar Bergman was given just a few weeks to build and install a
ferrite core memory Magnetic-core memory was the predominant form of 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 hard magnetic ...
in 1956. To get finished before the deadline they hired housewives with knitting experience to make the memory. One of the new memory bits did not work at first, but it was easily cut out and replaced.


Usage

BESK was inaugurated on 1 April 1954 and handled weather data for Carl-Gustaf Rossby and the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, statistics for the telecommunications service provider Televerket, wing profiles for the attack aircraft
Saab Lansen The Saab 32 Lansen (English: Lance) is a two-seat, transonic military aircraft designed and manufactured by Saab AB from 1955 to 1960 for the Swedish Air Force (''Flygvapnet''). Three principal variants of the Lansen were built for attack (A 3 ...
, and road profiles for the road authority Vägverket. During the nights
Swedish National Defence Radio Establishment Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
(FRA) used BESK for cracking encryption of radio messages (by Per-Erik Persson ''et al.''). BESK was also used for
calculation A calculation is a deliberate mathematical process that transforms one or more inputs into one or more outputs or ''results''. The term is used in a variety of senses, from the very definite arithmetical calculation of using an algorithm, to th ...
s for the Swedish nuclear energy industry, for example
Monte Carlo simulation Monte Carlo methods, or Monte Carlo experiments, are a broad class of computational algorithms that rely on repeated random sampling to obtain numerical results. The underlying concept is to use randomness to solve problems that might be determini ...
s of
neutron spectrum The neutron detection temperature, also called the neutron energy, indicates a free neutron's kinetic energy, usually given in electron volts. The term ''temperature'' is used, since hot, thermal and cold neutrons are moderated in a medium with ...
(by Per-Erik Persson ''et al.''), and for the
Swedish nuclear weapon program After World War II, Sweden considered building nuclear weapons to defend themselves against an offensive assault from the Soviet Union. From 1945 to 1972 the government ran a clandestine nuclear weapons program under the guise of civilian defe ...
, but most of those calculations were done by SMIL. In 1957
Hans Riesel Hans Ivar Riesel (May 28, 1929 in Stockholm – December 21, 2014) was a Swedish mathematician who discovered the 18th known Mersenne prime in 1957, using the computer BESK: this prime is 23217-1 and consists of 969 digits. He held the record ...
used BESK to discover a
Mersenne prime In mathematics, a Mersenne prime is a prime number that is one less than a power of two. That is, it is a prime number of the form for some integer . They are named after Marin Mersenne, a French Minim friar, who studied them in the early 17t ...
with 969 digits - the largest prime known at the time. SAAB rented computer time on the BESK to (probably, much was secret) make calculations of the strength of the
Saab Lansen The Saab 32 Lansen (English: Lance) is a two-seat, transonic military aircraft designed and manufactured by Saab AB from 1955 to 1960 for the Swedish Air Force (''Flygvapnet''). Three principal variants of the Lansen were built for attack (A 3 ...
attack aircraft. In the fall of 1955 SAAB thought the capacity was insufficient and started working on ''SAABs räkneautomat''
SARA Sara may refer to: Arts, media and entertainment Film and television * ''Sara'' (1992 film), 1992 Iranian film by Dariush Merhjui * ''Sara'' (1997 film), 1997 Polish film starring Bogusław Linda * ''Sara'' (2010 film), 2010 Sri Lankan Sinhal ...
, "SAAB's calculating machine", which was going to be twice as fast as BESK. Some former SARA employees went to
Facit Facit (''Facit AB'') was an industrial corporation and manufacturer of office products including furniture. It was based in Åtvidaberg, Sweden, and founded in 1922 as ''AB Åtvidabergs Industrier''. Facit AB, a manufacturer of mechanical calcu ...
and worked with the FACIT EDB. In the spring of 1956, eighteen of the BESK developers were hired by office equipment manufacturer
Facit Facit (''Facit AB'') was an industrial corporation and manufacturer of office products including furniture. It was based in Åtvidaberg, Sweden, and founded in 1922 as ''AB Åtvidabergs Industrier''. Facit AB, a manufacturer of mechanical calcu ...
and housed in an office at Karlavägen 62 in Stockholm, where they started to build copies of BESK called Facit EDB (models 1, 2, and 3), led by Carl-Ivar Bergman. A total of nine machines were built, of which four were used internally by Facit Electronics and five were sold to customers. On 1 July 1960 Facit Electronics, then with 135 employees, moved to Solna, just north of Stockholm. In 1960 BESK was used to create an animation of a car driving down a planned highway from the driver's perspective. This was one of the earliest computer animations ever made. The short clip was broadcast on Swedish national television on 9 November 1961.


Trivia

"Besk" is Swedish for the taste "bitter".
Bäsk Bäsk is a Swedish-style liquor flavored with wormwood ("malört" in Swedish) or anise. Sweden is one of the few countries that has never banned absinthe or other wormwood-flavored liquors. ''Bäsk'' is an old alternative spelling of the word ...
is also the name of a traditional bitters made from distilled alcohol seasoned with the herb '' Artemisia absinthium L.'' local to the province of
Skåne Scania, also known by its native name of Skåne (, ), is the southernmost of the historical provinces (''landskap'') of Sweden. Located in the south tip of the geographical region of Götaland, the province is roughly conterminous with Skåne C ...
, in which Lund is located. Reportedly this was an intentional and unnoticed pun after officials denied usage of the name ''CONIAC'' ( Conny almIntegrator And Calculator, compare Cognac and ENIAC) for the predecessor BARK.


See also

*
BARK Bark may refer to: * Bark (botany), an outer layer of a woody plant such as a tree or stick * Bark (sound), a vocalization of some animals (which is commonly the dog) Places * Bark, Germany * Bark, Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, Poland Arts, ...
- Binär Aritmetisk Relä-Kalkylator - Sweden's first computer. *
Elsa-Karin Boestad-Nilsson Elsa-Karin Boestad-Nilsson (25 November 1925 – 27 March 2020) was a Swedish computing pioneer who programmed the first and second computers in Sweden, BARK and BESK. Boestad-Nilsson was born on 25 November 1925 in Stockholm, the daughter of m ...
, a programmer on BARK and BESK * SMIL - SifferMaskinen I Lund (The Number Machine in Lund) *
History of computing hardware The history of computing hardware covers the developments from early simple devices to aid calculation to modern day computers. Before the 20th century, most calculations were done by humans. The first aids to computation were purely mechan ...
* List of vacuum tube computers


References


External links


Datorhistoriska nedslag
(in Swedish)
Google translation


(in Swedish)


BESK programmers manual
(in Swedish) * {{DEFAULTSORT:Besk IAS architecture computers Vacuum tube computers 1950s computers Science and technology in Sweden