Babbage’s Analytical Engine
device · 1837 · Industrial Revolution
A design for a general-purpose mechanical computer programmed with punched cards.
Inventor: Charles Babbage.
What it is made of
- Gear — has part. Gears performed the calculations.
Principles and materials it uses
- Punched card — uses. Operations and numbers were entered on punched cards.
- Program control of a machine — uses. The first concept of a general-purpose machine controlled by a program.
- Brass — is made of. The parts are brass.
- Cast iron — is made of. The frame is cast iron.
Where it is used
- Ada Lovelace’s program — is used in. The program was written for the Analytical Engine.
History: what it evolved from and what it influenced
- Jacquard loom — was inspired by. Babbage borrowed Jacquard’s punched cards directly for entering operations and data; Ada Lovelace compared the machine to the Jacquard loom.
- Babbage’s Difference Engine — evolved from. Babbage moved on to a general-purpose machine while working on the difference engine.
- Harvard Mark I — inspired. Howard Aiken named Babbage’s work as the source of his idea.
What it is a kind of
- Computing device — is a kind of. A design for a computing machine.