History of Computing: Learning from the Past: IFIP WG 9.7 International Conference, HC 2010, Held as Part of WCC 2010, Brisbane, Australia, September 20-23, ... in Information and Communication Technology)

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the IFIP WG 9.7 International Conference on the History of Computing, HC 2010, held as part of the 21st World Computer Congress, WCC 2010, in Brisbane, Australia, in September 2010. The 22 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions. The papers cover a broad scope of topics relating to the history of computing written both by historians and by those who were involved in creating this history, ranging from computing hardware, software and computer applications (including education) to social aspects of computing. Connections in the history of Australian computing -- John Deane Why the real thing is essential for telling our stories -- David Demant Wonder, sorcery, and technology : contribute to the history of Medieval robotics -- Nadia Ambrosetti Andrew D. Booth : Britain's other "Fourth Man" -- Roger G. Johnson The many dimensions of Kristen Nygaard, creator of object-oriented programming and the Scandinavian school of system development -- Drude Berntsen, Knut Elgsaas, and Håvard Hegna Projects and activities of the IPSJ Computer History Committee -- Eiiti Wada Contested histories : de-mythologising the early history of modern British computing -- David Anderson 50 years ago we constructed the first Hungarian tube computer, the M-3 : short stories from the History of the First Hungarian Computer (1957-1960) -- Győző Kovács Anatoly Kitov : pioneer of Russian informatics -- Vladimir A. Kitov and Valery V. Shilov Materiel Command and the materiality of commands : an historical examination of the US Air Force, Control Data Corporation, and the Advanced Logistics System -- Jeffrey R. Yost Purpose-built educational computers in the 1980s : the Australian experience -- Arthur Tatnall and Ralph Leonard And they were thinking? Basic, Logo, Personality and pedagogy -- John S. Murnane The life and growth of year 12 computing in Victoria : an ecological model -- Arthur Tatnall and Bill Davey History of the European computer driving licence -- Denise Leahy and Dudley Dolan A brief history of the Pick Environment in Australia -- Stasys Lukaitis Turning points in computer education -- Bill Davey and Kevin R. Parker Existence precedes essence : meaning of the stored-program concept -- Allan Olley Recession, S-curves and Digital Equipment Corporation -- David T. Goodwin and Roger G. Johnson ETHICS : the past, present and future of socio-technical systems design -- Shona Leitch and Matthew J. Warren Lessons from discarded computer architectures -- Andrew E. Fluck The birth of information systems -- Audra Lukaitis, Stasys Lukaitis, and Bill Davey The Monash University Museum of Computing History : ten years on -- A. Barbara Ainsworth, Christ Avram, and Judithe Sheard. History of Computing: Learning from the Past Why is the history of computing important? Given that the computer, as we now know it, came into existence less than 70 years ago it might seem a little odd to some people that we are concerned with its history. Isn't history about ‘old things'? Computing, of course, goes back much further than 70 years with many earlier - vices rightly being known as computers, and their history is, of course, important. It is only the history of electronic digital computers that is relatively recent. History is often justified by use of a quote from George Santayana who famously said that: ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it'. It is arguable whether there are particular mistakes in the history of computing that we should avoid in the future, but there is some circularity in this question, as the only way we will know the answer to this is to study our history. This book contains papers on a wide range of topics relating to the history of c- puting, written both by historians and also by those who were involved in creating this history. The papers are the result of an international conference on the History of Computing that was held as a part of the IFIP World Computer Congress in Brisbane in September 2010.