level: Level 1 Precomputers and Early Computers
Questions and Answers List
level questions: Level 1 Precomputers and Early Computers
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| How is it known that ancient civilizations had the ability to count and compute? | Based on archeological finds, such as notched bones, knotted twine, and hieroglyphics. |
| What is abacus? | The earliest recorded calculating device. |
| What did abacus know? | The abacus used primarily as an aid for basic arithmetic calculations. |
| What were the other computer devices of that time? | Other early computing devices include the slide rule, the mechanical calculator, and Dr. Herman Hollerith’s Punch Card Tabulating Machine and Sorter. |
| What is the fundamental element of the Hollerith's machine? | Read punch cards—special cards with holes punched in them to represent data. |
| What is an example of good practice with an Hollerith's machine? | Hollerith’s machine was used to process the 1890 U.S. Census data. |
| What could the Hollerith's machine do? | Hollerith's machine was able to complete the task in two and a half years, instead of the decade it usually took to process data manually. |
| Consequently, this is considered to be the first successful case of an information processing system replacing ... | a paper-and-pen-based system. |
| Hollerith’s company eventually became ... | International Business Machines (IBM). |