June 2012 - Members - lists.sigcis.org

another book by Knuth which is not another volume of TAOCP
by Dave Walden 08 Mar '13

08 Mar '13

See my review at <http://www.tug.org/books/reviews/tb103reviews-knuth9-walden.html>http://www.tug.org/books/reviews/tb103reviews-knuth9-walden.html It will be published in the upcoming issue of the TeX User Group's journal. As the review says, I think this will be a useful volume for computing historians whose research brings them toward Knuth's life and publications.

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"Stored Program" -- origins in IBM circa 1949?
by Thomas Haigh 19 Oct '12

19 Oct '12

Thanks to Peggy Kidwell (below) we have a confirmed sighting of "stored program" in the wild in 1949. In fact two, in internal IBM documents. This is very suggestive when taken in conjunction with something I noticed in searching the ACM DL yesterday, which is that 6 of the 11 uses it located through the end of 1960 were in papers written by IBM staff. So, an attractive hypothesis is that the term was coined within IBM Poughkeepsie in 1949 during early work on IBM's first experimental stored program computer, the Test Assembly. As the 604 calculator being cannibalized for its electronic arithmetic unit already had a plugboard programming mechanism it makes sense that the team would want a clear name for the separate capability they were building to execute a program stored in Williams Tubes backed by a drum. Tom From: Kidwell, Peggy [mailto:kidwellp@si.edu] Sent: Tuesday, April 03, 2012 11:43 AM To: 'David Alan Grier'; Thomas Haigh Subject: RE: [SIGCIS-Members] "Stored program" -- anyone know origins of the PHRASE The term "stored program" was used in internal IBM documents discussing the development of special circuits for the IBM 604 electronic calculating punch by 1949. See, for example, Nathaniel Rochester, "Plans for the Data Processing Test Assembly," Document 05.14.24. See also H. A. Mussell & C. E. Frizzell, "Stored Program," December 27, 1949, which refers to Rochester's paper. This had internal code 05.015.37. The reference is to programs stored on the drum of the machine or electrostatically, as opposed to on a plugboard. Peggy From: members-bounces(a)sigcis.org [mailto:members-bounces@sigcis.org] On Behalf Of David Alan Grier Sent: Monday, April 02, 2012 5:25 PM To: Thomas Haigh Cc: members(a)sigcis.org Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] "Stored program" -- anyone know origins of the PHRASE Tom Two bounds for your search. "Stored Program" is not in the 1950 IRE Standard on Computer Terms: <http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.proxygw.wrlc.org/xpl/articleDetails.jsp?tp=&arnu mber=1701474&contentType=Journals+%26+Magazines&ranges%3D1951_1956_p_Publica tion_Year%26matchBoolean%3Dtrue%26searchField%3DSearch_All%26queryText%3D%28 p_Title%3Acomputer+terms%29> Standards on Electronic Computers: Definitions ofTerms, 1950 <http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.proxygw.wrlc.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=10 933> Proceedings of the IRE Volume: 39 , <http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.proxygw.wrlc.org/xpl/tocresult.jsp?isnumber=3584 4> Issue: 3 Digital Object Identifier: <http://dx.doi.org.proxygw.wrlc.org/10.1109/JRPROC.1951.231840> 10.1109/JRPROC.1951.231840 Publication Year: 1951 , Page(s): 271 - 277 But it is used in the 1953 IRE article on programming. <http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.proxygw.wrlc.org/xpl/articleDetails.jsp?tp=&arnu mber=4051188&contentType=Journals+%26+Magazines&sortType%3Dasc_p_Publication _Year%26ranges%3D1953_1958_p_Publication_Year%26matchBoolean%3Dtrue%26search Field%3DSearch_All%26queryText%3D%28.QT.stored+program.QT.%29> Fundamentals of Digital Computer Programming Thomas, W.H. <http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.proxygw.wrlc.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=10 933> Proceedings of the IRE Volume: 41 , <http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.proxygw.wrlc.org/xpl/tocresult.jsp?isnumber=4051 180> Issue: 10 Digital Object Identifier: <http://dx.doi.org.proxygw.wrlc.org/10.1109/JRPROC.1953.274275> 10.1109/JRPROC.1953.274275 Publication Year: 1953 , Page(s): 1245 - 1249 I SHOULD NOTE THAT IT IS NOT USED IN THE COMPANION 1953 article on the IBM 701. David -------------------------------- David Alan Grier Fellow, IEEE President Elect, IEEE Computer Society Assoc. Prof., International Science & Technology Policy Center for International Science and Technology Policy grier(a)gwu.edu On Apr 2, 2012, at 4:34 PM, Thomas Haigh wrote: Hello everyone, I have a query related to a project I am working on concerning the conversion of ENIAC to stored program control in 1948, initially to run the first computerized Monte Carlo calculations. All this took place prior to the first operation of the Manchester Baby. That makes the question of what one means by "stored program" a very interesting one. This question was much discussed in the early days of the history of computing (1970s, early 1980s). I am starting to dig back into primary sources for early use of the phrases "stored program" and "stored program concept" to get a better idea of how these terms were used in the 1940s/early 1950s and what people thought they meant at the time. To clarify, almost everyone who has written about this cites the 1945 "First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC" as the initial dissemination of the stored program concept although there has been considerable debate as to the source of the ideas contained therein. However that document does not contain the phase "stored program." Or indeed use the word "program" in the body of the text. Or, remarkably, "EDVAC." "Stored" shows up a few times, though less frequently than "remembered." So, ignoring for the moment the relationship of the report to later definitions of the concept, we can agree that it was not the source of the phrase. The most obvious summary of the idea using the report's own terminology would be "remembered instruction device" rather than "stored program computer." I had thought about the 1946 Moore School lectures as a possible vector for the phase "stored program" as well as the concept. The phrase shows up many times in the Moore School lectures book but so far I have spotted it only in the 1980s editorial material rather than in the original lecture summaries. By 1954 "stored program computer" is showing up without explanation or citation required in the description of the IBM 650 published in the inaugural issue of Journal of the ACM. It is not particularly common in the ACM DL material for the rest of the decade ("automatic computer" and "digital computer" are more prevalent) but continues to pop up occasionally. The best the OED can do is 1957, which is even later. So, any thoughts on who came up with this phrase and when? I'm planning to dig deeper in search of early usage, for example into the 1950 "High-Speed Computing Devices" ERA book and some of the other CBI reprints from the 1940s, but it occurred to me that someone on the list might already know the answer to the question. Tom _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members(a)sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/ and you can change your subscription options at http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members

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The MCS-4 Story
by Dag Spicer 01 Jul '12

01 Jul '12

The link in my previous post on the Intel MCS-4 Story didn't come through. Here it is: http://www.youtube.ng/watch?v=gPKZSuXAVMU Dag -- Dag Spicer | Senior Curator | Computer History Museum Editorial Board | Annals of the History of Computing 1401 N. Shoreline Blvd. | Mountain View CA 94043 Tel: +1 650 810 1035 | Fax: +1 650 810 1055 Twitter: @ComputerHistory FB: facebook.com/computerhistory Technology married with the humanities makes our hearts sing. -- Steve Jobs

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Founding documents of Silicon Valley come to CHM!
by Dag Spicer 30 Jun '12

30 Jun '12

An official press release goes out Monday but for SIGCIS people, an exclusive! Thanks to Texas Instruments, CHM has just received 1,349 engineering notebooks from Fairchild Semiconductor Corporation, the seminal company in Silicon Valley from which most of the innovations in integrated circuit (IC) design and development came. Included are the personal logbooks of Robert Noyce, Gordon Moore, Jay Last, and Jean Hoerni among hundreds of others. These books have compared variously to the Rosetta Stone, the Magna Carta, the U.S. Constitution, the Declaration of the Rights of Man, &c And yet, these superlatives don't really do this remarkable collection of notebooks justice: they are more than books. As these meticulous records range in date from 1957 (the dawn of the integrated circuit) to 1987, the donation represents more of a motion picture of IC development, full of amazing plot twists, interesting actors, and hard work. The collection is now being processed by CHM archives staff, a process that should take about 2 years. You'll be happy to know that CHM has committed to place at least a portion of these notebooks online. Read the first public news story in today's San Jose Mercury News. (URL: http://www.mercurynews.com/mike-cassidy/ci_20974528/cassidy-silicon-valley-…) Enjoy! Dag -- Dag Spicer | Senior Curator | Computer History Museum Editorial Board | Annals of the History of Computing 1401 N. Shoreline Blvd. | Mountain View CA 94043 Tel: +1 650 810 1035 | Fax: +1 650 810 1055 Twitter: @ComputerHistory FB: facebook.com/computerhistory Technology married with the humanities makes our hearts sing. -- Steve Jobs

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New CHM Movie! Intel's 'The MCS-4 Story'
by Dag Spicer 29 Jun '12

29 Jun '12

Dear SIGCIS Friends, CHM has archived into the collection a rare and original Intel movie called "The MCS-4 Story," about (of course) the 4004 and its associated ICs and systems. You can watch it here on the CHM YouTube channel. Here is the description of the movie: This video describes the world's first commercial microprocessor available as a separate component, the Intel 4004. The announcement by Intel on November 15, 1971 in Electronics News introduced the "MCS-4," a family of integrated circuits (ICs) that was based on the 4004 central processing unit (CPU), the 4001 read-only memory (ROM), the 4002 random access memory (RAM) and the 4003 I/O expansion IC. MCS-4, which stands for "Micro Computer Set 4," was targeted towards users of random digital logic, that is designers of systems in which functions were hard-wired into a system's circuitry, usually using medium scale integration (MSI) ICs. The huge step of the MCS-4 was that it allowed this random logic to be replaced by software. This allowed designers to create products that were more flexible and which had features not possible to implement with random logic. Typical intended applications included process control, elevators, traffic lights, medical systems, aviation and test equipment, to name but a few. The video provides considerable detail into the functioning the MCS-4 system, beginning with a block level description, followed by timing, instruction set and cycle-by-cycle descriptions of typical functions. The 4004 CPU was followed by the 8008, 8080 and, ultimately, the 8086 family, which became the basis of Intel's processor architecture for the next 40 years. Enjoy! Dag -- Dag Spicer | Senior Curator | Computer History Museum Editorial Board | Annals of the History of Computing 1401 N. Shoreline Blvd. | Mountain View CA 94043 Tel: +1 650 810 1035 | Fax: +1 650 810 1055 Twitter: @ComputerHistory FB: facebook.com/computerhistory Technology married with the humanities makes our hearts sing. -- Steve Jobs

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Best paper awards for Social Informatics
by Thomas Haigh 29 Jun '12

29 Jun '12

A reminder of these annual prizes. "Social informatics" is intended to encompass historical work on the adoption and use of information technology. An argument could also be made for papers taking a clearly articulated "social shaping/social construction" argument with respect to a technology. There are two emails below. One is for the "best paper" published in 2011, one is for the best published paper or conference paper delivered by a student in 2011. The cash awards may not fully cover the cost of going to ASIS&T to collect them, so will be most attractive to people with a preexisting interest in engaging with this community. Tom --------------------------- STUDENT PAPER ANNOUNCEMENT --------------------------- Howard Rosenbaum hrosenba at indiana.edu Wed Jun 27 17:13:03 EDT 2012 Subject: Call for nomination for the 2012 Social Informatics Best Student Paper Award The Special Interest Group for Social Informatics (SIG-SI) is seeking nominations for an award for the best paper written by a doctoral student on a topic informed by social informatics. Nominations may include a published paper in a peer reviewed journal during 2011 or a conference paper presented in 2011. The author or authors will present their paper and receive a $500 cash award at the 2012 Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) in Baltimore in October, 2012. At least one author must be present at the workshop to receive the award. Nominations letters should be sent to Howard Rosenbaum (hrosenba at indiana.edu) or Pnina Fichman (fichman at indiana.edu) by August 10, 2012 and must include a full citation, a brief explanation for the nomination, and a copy of the article. Self nominations are acceptable. Winners will be notified by September 7, 2012, in time for conference early registration (NOTE: this timeline may be adjusted when the registration dates are announced). ASIS&T Special Interest Group for Social Informatics ---------------------------- PUBLISHED PAPER ANNOUNCEMENT ---------------------------- -----Original Message----- From: sigtis-l-bounces(a)asis.org [mailto:sigtis-l-bounces@asis.org] On Behalf Of Howard Rosenbaum Sent: Wednesday, June 27, 2012 4:13 PM To: sigtis-l(a)asis.org Subject: [Sigtis-l] ASIST SIG-SI> Call for nominations for the 2012 Social Informatics Best Paper Award Call for nominations for the 2012 Social Informatics Best Paper Award The Special Interest Group for Social Informatics (SIG-SI) is seeking nominations for an award for the best paper published in a peer reviewed journal on a topic informed by social informatics during the 2011 calendar year. The author or authors will present their paper and receive a $1,000 cash award at the 2012 Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science and Technology in Baltimore in October, 2012. At least one author must be present at the workshop to receive the award. Nominations letters should be sent to Howard Rosenbaum (hrosenba(a)indiana.edu) or Pnina Fichman (fichman(a)indiana.edu) by August 10, 2012 and must include a full citation, a brief explanation for the nomination, and a copy of the article. Self nominations are acceptable. Winners will be notified by September 7, 2012, in time for conference early registration (NOTE: this timeline may be adjusted when the registration dates are announced). ASIS&T Special Interest Group for Social Informatics _______________________________________________ Sigtis-l mailing list Sigtis-l(a)asis.org http://mail.asis.org/mailman/listinfo/sigtis-l

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death of minitel
by Jonathan Coopersmith 29 Jun '12

29 Jun '12

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18610692 -- Jonathan Coopersmith Associate Professor Department of History Texas A&M University College Station, TX 77843-4326 979.845.7151 979.862.4314 fax http://aggiegaijin.blogspot.com/

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New CHM Lecture videos: UNIVAC, Bell Labs
by Dag Spicer 23 Jun '12

23 Jun '12

Dear friends, We have recently posted two new CHM lectures to YouTube: #1: "From the UNIVAC to Web 2.0: Politics and the Making of a 21st Century Presidency" Panel discussion: Ticker Bounds, Manager, Corporate Communications, Facebook Christopher Lehane, Fabiani and Lehane, former special assistant to President Bill Clinton Sarah Feinberg, Director, Policy Communications, Facebook Moderator: Richard Tedlow, Harvard Business School [Recorded: May 9, 2012] Dateline: November 4, 1952: UNIVAC Predicts an Eisenhower Win! Sixty years ago this November, public opinion polls gave the 1952 Presidential election to Adlai Stevenson. UNIVAC, star of CBS' election coverage (along with a new anchor, Walter Cronkite), predicted an Eisenhower landslide. UNIVAC was right. The computer's TV debut captivated an audience already enthralled by technology and confronting new tools—and new terminology—almost daily. "UNIVAC" became synonymous with "computer" for a generation of Americans. Although much has changed since 1952, technology and politics remain closely intertwined. We'll look at the history of using computing to poll and predict election outcomes, as well as how campaigns have used technology, as the Obama team did in 2008, to win elections. What are the implications of technology-driven campaigns and the electorate's use of social media on our republic? What are the positives and negatives associated with all of this connectivity? The panel will also look beyond U.S. borders to discuss the possible ramifications of the Arab Spring and whether other global political shifts may be looming. Easy, global access to social media tools has definitely created a power shift -- from institutions to individuals. But what does that shift really mean -- what are the larger implications to global stability? URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nmn3hxDpsCE&feature=plcp #2: "The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation" Author Jon Gertner in conversation with KQED's Dave Iverson [Recorded: March 28, 2012] Bell Laboratories, which thrived from the 1920s to the 1980s, was the most innovative and productive institution of the twentieth century. Long before America's brightest scientific minds began migrating west to Silicon Valley, they flocked to this sylvan campus in the New Jersey suburbs built and funded by AT&T. At its peak, Bell Labs employed nearly fifteen thousand people, twelve hundred of whom had PhDs. Thirteen would go on to win Nobel prizes. It was a citadel of science and scholarship as well as a hotbed of creative thinking. It was, in effect, a factory of ideas whose workings have remained largely hidden until now. New York Times Magazine writer Jon Gertner unveils the unique magic of Bell Labs through the eyes and actions of its scientists. These ingenious, often eccentric men would become revolutionaries, and sometimes legends, whether for inventing radio astronomy in their spare time (and on the company's dime), riding unicycles through the corridors, or pioneering the principles that propel today's technology. In these pages, we learn how radar came to be, and lasers, transistors, satellites, mobile phones, and much more. Even more important, Gertner reveals the forces that set off this explosion of creativity. Bell Labs combined the best aspects of the academic and corporate worlds, hiring the brightest and usually the youngest minds, creating a culture and even an architecture that forced employees in different fields to work together, in virtually complete intellectual freedom, with little pressure to create moneymaking innovations. In Gertner's portrait, we come to understand why both researchers and business leaders look to Bell Labs as a model and long to incorporate its magic into their own work. Join author Jon Gertner for a fascinating conversation with KQED's Dave Iverson about the people and history of Bell Labs, and the ways it fostered a culture of innovation and ideas. URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e90sw6-qxmE&feature=relmfu Dag PS If you'd like to get automatic notices, just sign up to CHM's YouTube channel. -- Dag Spicer | Senior Curator | Computer History Museum Editorial Board | Annals of the History of Computing 1401 N. Shoreline Blvd. | Mountain View CA 94043 Tel: +1 650 810 1035 | Fax: +1 650 810 1055 Twitter: @ComputerHistory FB: facebook.com/computerhistory Technology married with the humanities makes our hearts sing. -- Steve Jobs

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Gordon Bell history/memoir of The Computer Museum
by Thomas Haigh 22 Jun '12

22 Jun '12

Hello everyone, I recently came across a link to his interesting history/memoir by Gordon Bell with the story of the creation, growth, decline, and Californian rebirth of the Computer Museum he founded in Boston. http://research.microsoft.com/pubs/147240/Bell_Origin_of_the_Computer_Histor y_Museum_v2.pdf Tom

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_History Hunting_ by James Cortada
by Dave Walden 22 Jun '12

22 Jun '12

I heard about _History Hunding: A Guide for Fellow Adventurers_ last Friday. I ordered a copy from Amazon Saturday and it arrived the day before yesterday. I have now read it, and I recommend it to you. The book is partially a memoir of Cortada's life as a historian, partially a how-to book, and partially a statement of what Cortada believes are the proper roles of history and historians. (This is my summary, not his.) As an amateur historian of computing history, I think the book is wonderful. It is fun and easy to read. It is educational. It is inspirational ! I suspect it would be an outstanding book to assign to college students of history who have not yet decided whether to follow the academic tenure track approach to history or find some other way to do history while following a less prescribed career path. The book also discusses how historians in the academy might participate in bigger, less individual history pursuits. It is very complimentary to librarians, archivists, used bookstore owners, etc., as people who can help historians. Reading the book is going to adjust somewhat my approach to "doing history."

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