Computing is any goal-oriented activity requiring, benefiting from, or creating computing machinery. It includes the study and experimentation of algorithmic processes, and the development of both hardware and software. Computing has scientific, engineering, mathematical, technological, and social aspects. Major computing disciplines include computer engineering, computer science, cybersecurity, data science, information systems, information technology, and software engineering.
Charles Babbage was an English polymath. A mathematician, philosopher, inventor and mechanical engineer, Babbage originated the concept of a digital programmable computer.
Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas pigeon post is not. Ancient signalling systems, although sometimes quite extensive and sophisticated as in China, were generally not capable of transmitting arbitrary text messages. Possible messages were fixed and predetermined, so such systems are thus not true telegraphs.
In computer technology and telecommunications, online indicates a state of connectivity, and offline indicates a disconnected state. In modern terminology, this usually refers to an Internet connection, but could refer to any piece of equipment or functional unit that is connected to a larger system. Being online means that the equipment or subsystem is connected, or that it is ready for use.
The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century's On-Line Pioneers is a 1998 book by Tom Standage. The book was first published in September 1998 through Walker & Company and discusses the development and uses of the electric telegraph during the second half of the 19th century and some of the similarities the telegraph shared with the Internet of the late 20th century.
Dan Gillmor is an American technology writer and columnist. He was director of News Co/Lab, an initiative to elevate news literacy and awareness, at Arizona State University's Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. Dan Gillmor is also in the board of directors of The Signals Network, a non-profit organization supporting whistleblowers.
Tom Kilburn was an English mathematician and computer scientist. Over his 30-year career, he was involved in the development of five computers of great historical significance. With Freddie Williams he worked on the Williams–Kilburn tube and the world's first electronic stored-program computer, the Manchester Baby, while working at the University of Manchester. His work propelled Manchester and Britain into the forefront of the emerging field of computer science.
John Gross FRSL was an English man of letters. A leading intellectual, writer, anthologist, and critic, The Guardian and The Spectator were among several publications to describe Gross as "the best-read man in Britain". The Guardian's obituarist Ion Trewin wrote: "Mr Gross is one good argument for the survival of the species", a comment Gross would have disliked since he was known for his modesty. Charles Moore wrote in The Spectator: "I am left with the irritated sense that he was under-appreciated. He was too clever, too witty, too modest for our age."
Brian Jack Copeland is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand, and author of books on the computing pioneer Alan Turing.
Chronocentrism is the assumption that certain time periods are better, more important, or a more significant frame of reference than other time periods, either past or future. The perception of more positive attributes such as morality, technology, and sophistication to one's own time could lead an individual as a member of a collectivity to impose their forms of time on others and impede the efforts towards more homogeneous temporal commons.
Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software (1999) is a book by Charles Petzold that seeks to teach how personal computers work at a hardware and software level. In the preface to the 2000 softcover edition, Petzold wrote that his goal was for readers to understand how computers work at a concrete level that "just might even rival that of electrical engineers and programmers" and that he "went as far back" as he could go in regard to the history of technological development. Petzold describes Code as being structured as moving "up each level in the hierarchy" in which computers are constructed. On June 10, 2022, Petzold announced that an expanded second edition would be published later that year. The second edition was released on July 28, 2022, along with an interactive companion website developed by Petzold.
Virginia Heffernan is an American journalist and cultural critic. Since 2015, she has been a political columnist at the Los Angeles Times and a cultural columnist at Wired. From 2003 to 2011, she worked as a staff writer for The New York Times, first as a television critic, then as a magazine columnist, and then as an opinion writer. She has also worked as a senior editor for Harper's Magazine, as a founding editor of Talk, and as a TV critic for Slate. Her 2016 book Magic and Loss: The Internet as Art argued that the Internet is a "massive and collective work of art", one that is a "work in progress", and that the suggested deterioration of attention spans in response to it is a myth.
The Jargon File is a glossary and usage dictionary of slang used by computer programmers. The original Jargon File was a collection of terms from technical cultures such as the MIT AI Lab, the Stanford AI Lab (SAIL) and others of the old ARPANET AI/LISP/PDP-10 communities, including Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN), Carnegie Mellon University, and Worcester Polytechnic Institute. It was published in paperback form in 1983 as The Hacker's Dictionary, revised in 1991 as The New Hacker's Dictionary.
Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100 is a 2011 book by theoretical physicist Michio Kaku, author of Hyperspace and Physics of the Impossible. In it Kaku speculates about possible future technological development over the next 100 years. He interviews notable scientists about their fields of research and lays out his vision of coming developments in medicine, computing, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, and energy production. The book was on the New York Times Bestseller List for five weeks.
An Edible History of Humanity is a book written by Tom Standage that encompasses the history of the world from prehistory to modern day times through the tracing of foods and agricultural techniques used by man.
Mar Hicks is a historian of technology, gender and modern Europe, notable for their work on the history of women in computing. Hicks is a professor at the University of Virginia’s School of Data Science. Hicks wrote the 2017 book, Programmed Inequality: How Britain Discarded Women Technologists and Lost Its Edge in Computing.
Jack Schofield was a British technology journalist. He wrote the Ask Jack column for The Guardian and preceding that covered technology for the newspaper from 1983 to 2010. He edited photography and computing periodicals and produced a number of books on photography and on computing, including The Darkroom Book (1981).
Edmund Fawcett is a British political journalist and author.
Stuart Dermot Lee is a British specialist in information technology at Oxford University Computing Services and a Reader in E-learning at Oxford University, but is best known for his scholarly books on J. R. R. Tolkien. He has written several plays, two of which won Oxford Playhouse new writing awards.
