Welcome to the computer world. Practice materials for 1st year students. Еранина Т.И - 15 стр.

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                    In 1946 two engineers at the University of Pennsylvania,
        J.Eckert and J.Maushly, built their digital computer with vacuum tubes.
        They named their new invention ENIAC (the Electronic Numerical
        Integrator and Calculator).
                    Another important achievement in developing computers
        came in 1947, when John von Neumann developed the idea of keeping
        instructions for the computer inside the computer's memory. The
        contribution of John von Neumann was particularly significant. As
        contrasted with Babbage's analytical engine, which was designed to store
        only data, von Neumann's machine, called the Electronic Discrete
        Variable Computer, or EDVAC, was able to store both data and
        instructions. He also contributed to the idea of storing data and
        instructions in a binary code that uses only ones and zeros. This
        simplified computer design. Thus computers use two conditions, high
        voltage, and low voltage, to translate the symbols by which we commu-
        nicate into unique combinations of electrical pulses. We refer to these
        combinations as codes.
                    Neumann's stored program computer as well as other ma-
        chines of that time were made possible by the invention of the vacuum
        tube that could control and amplify electronic signals. Early computers,
        using vacuum tubes, could perform computations in thousandths of
        seconds, called milliseconds, instead of seconds required by mechanical
        devices.

Task 8. Answer the questions about the text.

        1. When was the first analog computer built? 2. Where and how was
        that computer used? 3. When did the first digital computers appear? 4.
        Who was the inventor of the first digital computer? 5. What could that
        device do? 6. What is ENIAC? Decode the word. 7. What was
        J.Neumann's contribution into the development of computers? 8. What
        were the advantages of EDVAC in comparison with ENIAC? 9. What
        does binary code earn? 10. Due to what invention could the first digital
        computers be built?

Task 9. Find the English equivalents of the following word combinations in
        the text.

                  Цифровые компьютеры; технические усовершенствова-
        ния; совершенствование компьютеров; ответственный за
        изобретение; математические задачи; электронные трубки; важное
        достижение; запоминающее устройство; значительный вклад;
        двоичный код; высокое напряжение; низкое напряжение;
        электрические импульсы; тысячная доля секунды.