EM TECH

• The Premechanical Period spanned from 3000 BCE to 1450 CE, during which humans started communicating with one another using words and pictograms carved in rocks.
• During the Premechanical Period, humans started writing symbols that depict ideas, objects, and animals.
• Due to the impracticality of using stone tablets, humans later discovered the Papyrus Plant.
• The discovery of paper led to the birth of books.
• Through books, it was easier to store and compile papers, which later gave birth to Libraries, the first data centers in history.
• In the late stages of the Premechanical Period, humans started using the numerical system.
• The numerical system gradually spread around the world, enabling a simpler, faster, and more organized way of counting.
• The abacus is a manually operated device similar to the modern calculator, considered as the first device to process information.
• The Mechanical Period 1450 – 1840 

  -People in this era were into speeding and automating things around them with the use of steam and gears

  -Mechanical period concentrated mainly on developing machines that will enhance calculation speed.

  Blaise Pascal 1623 - 1662- A famous French mathematician inventor who invented the first mechanical calculator called the Pascaline

  Charles Babbage 1791-1871- English Mathematician who invented the first programmable mechanical computer known as the analytical engine. It made him acquire the title “Father of Computers”
• The discovery of ways to harness electricity was the key advancement that was made during the Electro-Mechanical Period, which lasted from 1840 to 1940.
• The need to share information with one another in a faster yet reliable manner over long distances aroused during the Electro-Mechanical Period.
• Samuel Morse, an American inventor, introduced the first single-circuit telegraph, which gave rise to the Morse code, in 1844.
• Alexander Graham Bell, a famous inventor, made the telephone as a means for voice transmission in 1876.
• The telephone converts sounds into electricity and enables the telephone network to transmit it over copper wires.
• Computing devices started to revolutionize information handling and processing during the Electro-Mechanical Period.
• Machines were mechanical by nature but were run by electricity during the Electro-Mechanical Period.
• Dr. Arthur Scherbius, a German electrical engineer, invented the famous mechanical cipher called the Enigma Machine during the Electro-Mechanical Period.
• Alan Turing, an English mathematician, invented the device that cracked the Enigma called The Bombe during the Electro-Mechanical Period.
• The Bombe is an electro-mechanical device used by British cryptologists to help decipher German Enigma-machine-encrypted secret messages during World War II.
• The late period of vacuum tube machines is the start of the electronic period.
• A vacuum tube is a device used to control the flow of electric current using a vacuum in a sealed container.
• The Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC), is the first electronic and general purpose computer, marking a revolutionary period in computing.
• Due to ENIAC’s big size, its processing speed was slower than those of machines used today.
• John Mauchly and Presper Eckert are the inventors of ENIAC.
• William Bradford Shockley, Walter Houser Brattain, and John Bardeen are the inventors of the transistor.
• Jack Kilby, an American electrical engineer, is the inventor of the integrated circuit.
• Computer processors were invented later on, leading to the evolution of basic textual interfaces to graphical user interfaces (GUI).
• Pier Giorgio Perotto, an Italian computer scientist, is the inventor of the Olivetti Programma, the world’s first personal computer.
• Philip Don Estridge, the father of the IBM PC, is an American computer scientist.
• The IBM 5150 is the first personal computer developed by IBM.