COBOL and gutenberg printing press: what they have in common
- Step 1. COBOL — is a kind of — Programming language. A language.
- Step 2. Programming language — evolved from — Ada Lovelace’s program. Lovelace is regarded as the first programmer.
- Step 3. Ada Lovelace’s program — uses — Babbage’s Analytical Engine. The program was written for the Analytical Engine.
- Step 4. Babbage’s Analytical Engine — was inspired by — Jacquard loom. Babbage borrowed Jacquard’s punched cards directly for entering operations and data; Ada Lovelace compared the machine to the Jacquard loom.
- Step 5. Jacquard loom — works like — Gutenberg printing press. An analogy, not proven influence: both set type and a chain of punched cards are a replaceable pattern that a machine reproduces over and over.