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3. Third Generation Computers (1959
-1971) - IC
1959 - Jack Kilby of Texas Instruments
patented the first integrated circuit in Feb.
1959; Kilby had made his first germanium IC in
Oct. 1958; Robert Noyce at Fairchild used planar
process to make connections of components within
a silicon IC in early 1959; the first commercial
product using IC was the hearing aid in Dec. 1963;
General Instrument made LSI chip (100+ components)
for Hammond organs 1968
1964 - IBM produced SABRE, the
first airline reservation tracking system for
American Airlines; IBM announced the System/360
all-purpose computer, using 8-bit character word
length (a "byte") that was pioneered
in the 7030 of April 1961 that grew out of the
AF contract of Oct. 1958 following Sputnik to
develop transistor computers for BMEWS
1968 - DEC introduced the first
"mini-computer", the PDP-8, named after
the mini-skirt; DEC was founded in 1957 by Kenneth
H. Olsen who came for the SAGE project at MIT
and began sales of the PDP-1 in 1960
1969 - Development began on ARPAnet,
funded by the DOD
1971 - Intel produced large scale
integrated (LSI) circuits that were used in the
digital delay line, the first digital audio device
4. Fourth Generation (1971-Present) - microprocessor
1971 - Gilbert Hyatt at Micro
Computer Co. patented the microprocessor; Ted
Hoff at Intel in February introduced the 4-bit
4004, a VSLI of 2300 components, for the Japanese
company Busicom to create a single chip for a
calculator; IBM introduced the first 8-inch "memory
disk", as it was called then, or the "floppy
disk" later; Hoffmann-La Roche patented the
passive LCD display for calculators and watches;
in November Intel announced the first microcomputer,
the MCS-4; Nolan Bushnell designed the first commercial
arcade video game "Computer Space"
1972 - Intel made the 8-bit 8008
and 8080 microprocessors; Gary Kildall wrote his
Control Program/Microprocessor (CP/M) disk operating
system to provide instructions for floppy disk
drives to work with the 8080 processor. He offered
it to Intel, but was turned down, so he sold it
on his own, and soon CP/M was the standard operating
system for 8-bit microcomputers; Bushnell created
Atari and introduced the successful "Pong"
game
1973 - IBM developed the first
true sealed hard disk drive, called the "Winchester"
after the rifle company, using two 30 Mb platters;
Robert Metcalfe at Xerox PARC created Ethernet
as the basis for a local area network, and later
founded 3COM
1974 - Xerox developed the Alto
workstation at PARC, with a monitor, a graphical
user interface, a mouse, and an ethernet card
for networking
1975 - the Altair personal computer
is sold in kit form, and influenced Steve Jobs
and Steve Wozniak
1976 - Jobs and Wozniak developed
the Apple personal computer; Alan Shugart introduced
the 5.25-inch floppy disk
1977 - Nintendo in Japan began to make computer
games that stored the data on chips inside a game
cartridge that sold for around $40 but only cost
a few dollars to manufacture. It introduced its
most popular game "Donkey Kong" in 1981,
Super Mario Bros in 1985
1978 - Visicalc spreadsheet software
was written by Daniel Bricklin and Bob Frankston
1979 - Micropro released Wordstar
that set the standard for word processing software
1980 - IBM signed a contract
with the Microsoft Co. of Bill Gates and Paul
Allen and Steve Ballmer to supply an operating
system for IBM's new PC model. Microsoft paid
$25,000 to Seattle Computer for the rights to
QDOS that became Microsoft DOS, and Microsoft
began its climb to become the dominant computer
company in the world.
1984 - Apple Computer introduced
the Macintosh personal computer January 24.
1987 - Bill Atkinson of Apple
Computers created a software program called HyperCard
that was bundled free with all Macintosh computers.
This program for the first time made hypertext
popular and useable to a wide number of people.
Ted Nelson coined the terms "hypertext"
and "hypermedia" in 1965 based on the
pre-computer ideas of Vannevar Bush published
in his "As We May Think" article in
the July 1945 issue of The Atlantic Monthly.
5. Fifth Generation (Present and Beyond)
1991 - World-Wide Web (WWW) was
developed by Tim Berners-Lee and released by CERN.
1993 - The first Web browser
called Mosaic was created by student Marc Andreesen
and programmer Eric Bina at NCSA in the first
3 months of 1993. The beta version 0.5 of X Mosaic
for UNIX was released Jan. 23 1993 and was instant
success. The PC and Mac versions of Mosaic followed
quickly in 1993. Mosaic was the first software
to interpret a new IMG tag, and to display graphics
along with text. Berners-Lee objected to the IMG
tag, considered it frivolous, but image display
became one of the most used features of the Web.
The Web grew fast because the infrastructure was
already in place: the Internet, desktop PC, home
modems connected to online services such as AOL
and Compuserve
1994 - Netscape Navigator 1.0
was released Dec. 1994, and was given away free,
soon gaining 75% of world browser market.
1996 - Microsoft failed to recognized
the importance of the Web, but finally released
the much imporoved browser Explorer 3.0 in the
summer.
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