Title
The ORDVAC and the ILLIAC by James E. Robertson
Catalog Number
102695475
Type
Moving image
Description
The First International Research Conference on the History of Computing was a milestone in the history of computing, drawing a global elite of computer pioneers from the first generation of electronic digital computing. Most talks are approximately 45 minutes in duration and feature a lecture with a brief question and answer period afterwards.
In his modest introduction, the speaker notes he was a graduate student during the period of constructions of these two large computer systems and that his purpose is to highlight the people and personalities involved in these pioneering days of computing. In January 1949, an agreement was made between the University of Illinois and the Ballistic Research Laboratories, a US Army computation bureau to build two massive computers, ORDVAC and the ILLIAC, based on the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) architecture as established by the group under von Neumann at Princeton. Both were completed by Labor Day weekend of 1952. Roberston goes on to describe in detail how ILLIAC was programmed and several of the projects it was used on.
This lecture’s transcript was included in the edited volume from the conference, viz. Robertson, James, E., “The ORDVAC and the ILLIAC,” in Metropolis, N., and Howlett, J., Rota, Gian-Carlo, A History of Computing in the Twentieth Century, New York: Academic Press, 1980, pp. 347 – 364.
Date
1976-06-10
Credits
Robertson, James E.
Participants
|
Robertson, James E., Speaker
|
Place of Publication
Los Alamos, NM, US
Identifying Numbers
| Other number |
Reel 8 |
Original tape numbering |
Duration
00:28:30
Dimensions
10 inches
Format
Betacam SP
Category
Lecture
Series Title
International Research Conference on the History of Computing
