ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book discusses manual information processing and early technologies and describes the origins of office machinery and the business-machine industry. It also describes Charles Babbage's failed attempt to build a calculating engine in the 1830s and its realization by Harvard University and International Business Machines (IBM) a century later. The book then discusses the theoretical developments associated with Alan Turing. It covers the development of the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC) at the University of Pennsylvania during the war and its successor, the EDVAC, which was the blueprint for almost all subsequent computers up to the present day. The book explores the early development of the computer industry, which transformed the computer from a scientific instrument for mathematical computation into a machine for business data processing. It examines the development of the mainframe computer industry, focusing on the IBM System/360 range of computers.
