Related - an essential resource for this subject is Tom MIsa’s chapter, “Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace, and the Bernoulli Numbers,” which is Chapter 2 in Ada’s Legacy: Cultures of Computing from the Victorian to the Digital Age <https://dl.acm.org/doi/book/10.1145/2809523> (ACM Books, 2015). If you are an ACM member, or if your library has an institutional subscription to ACM Books via the ACM Digital Library, you should be able to access Tom’s excellent chapter here: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2809523.2809527. Andy
On Mar 14, 2022, at 10:09 AM, Evan Koblentz <evank@njit.edu> wrote:
I never dived deeply into Babbage/Lovelace before teaching this semester. In preparing for the first classing meeting, back in January, I read a lot of primary sources about the protagonists.
I learned that Babbage wrote a couple of dozen programs between 1836-1840. That includes the one on Bernoulli, which Lovelace put into her appendices while translating Menabrea’s work in 1843.
There is little doubt that Lovelace saw farther than Babbage in documenting that a computer could do more than just mathematics, but it makes me want to scream when I read things like the play’s homepage which states: “The programming: that was all Ada” – that is false.
From: Members <members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org <mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>> on behalf of "Ceruzzi, Paul" <CeruzziP@si.edu <mailto:CeruzziP@si.edu>> Date: Monday, March 14, 2022 at 9:50 AM To: "members@SIGCIS.org <mailto:members@SIGCIS.org>" <members@sigcis.org <mailto:members@sigcis.org>> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] Play about Ada and Babbage
This message is a little late, and it may appeal only to those of you in the DC area, although I believe the play will be staged in other cities. I haven't seen it yet but plan to next week. A play about Ada Augusta and Charles Babbage:
https://avantbard.org/project/ada-and-the-engine/ <https://avantbard.org/project/ada-and-the-engine/> <https://avantbard.org/project/ada-and-the-engine/> Ada and The Engine - Avant Bard Theatre <https://avantbard.org/project/ada-and-the-engine/> From prolific playwright Lauren Gunderson, Ada and the Engine is a whimsical scientific history sure to delight audiences. avantbard.org <http://avantbard.org/> Paul Ceruzzi _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>