IAS machine
{{short description|First electronic computer to be built at the Institute for Advanced Study}}
{{Infobox information appliance
| name = IAS machine
| image = IAS machine at Smithsonian.jpg
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| caption = The IAS machine on display at the Smithsonian Institution
| aka =
| developer = John von Neumann
| manufacturer = Institute for Advanced Study (IAS)
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| releasedate = {{Start date and age|1952|06|10}}
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| lifespan = 1952–1958
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| cpu = 1,700 vacuum tubes
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| memory = 1,024 words (5.1 kilobytes)
| RAMtype = Williams tubes
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| weight = {{Convert|1000|lb|kg}}
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{{Computer architecture bit widths}}
File:James Pomerene IAS machine.jpg working on the IAS machine]]
The IAS machine was the first electronic computer built at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) in Princeton, New Jersey. It is sometimes called the von Neumann machine, since the paper describing its design was edited by John von Neumann, a mathematics professor at both Princeton University and IAS. The computer was built under his direction, starting in 1946 and finished in 1951.{{cite web |title=The IAS Computer, 1952 |publisher= National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution |url=http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_334741 }}
The general organization is called von Neumann architecture, even though it was both conceived and implemented by others.{{cite book |title= Computer Organization |author1=Deepali A.Godse |author2= Atul P.Godse |pages= 3–9 |publisher= Technical Publications |year= 2010 |isbn= 978-81-8431-772-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AIHgbyyEIHoC&pg=PA3 }} The computer is in the collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of American History but is not currently on display.[http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_334741 Smithsonian IAS webpage]
History
File:Oppenheimer & Neumann.jpg and John von Neumann in front of the IAS machine]]
Julian Bigelow was hired as chief engineer in May 1946.{{cite news |title= Julian Bigelow, 89, Mathematician and Computer Pioneer |author= John Markoff |date= February 22, 2003 |newspaper= The New York Times |url= https://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/22/business/julian-bigelow-89-mathematician-and-computer-pioneer.html |author-link= John Markoff }} Ralph J. Slutz, Hewitt Crane, Herman Goldstine, Gerald Estrin, Arthur Burks, George W. Brown and Willis Ware also worked on the project.
The machine was in limited operation in the summer of 1951 and fully operational on June 10, 1952.{{cite book|last=Goldstein|first=Herman|title=The Computer: From Pascal to von Neumann|year=1972|publisher=Princeton University Press|location=Princeton, NJ|isbn=0-691-02367-0|pages=317–318|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3FvELn2KiUYC&q=ias+1952&pg=PA317}}{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pmPaAgAAQBAJ&q=%22ias%22+Computer+1951+operation&pg=PA310|title=John Von Neumann: The Scientific Genius who Pioneered the Modern Computer, Game Theory, Nuclear Deterrence, and Much More|last=Macrae|first=Norman|date=1999|publisher=American Mathematical Soc.|isbn=9780821826768|pages=310|language=en}}{{cite journal|title=Automatic Computing Machinery: News - Institute for Advanced Study|journal=Mathematics of Computation|date=Oct 1952|volume=6|issue=40|pages=245–246|doi=10.1090/S0025-5718-52-99384-8|issn=0025-5718|doi-access=free}} It was in operation until July 15, 1958.{{citation | first = George | last = Dyson | contribution = George Dyson at the birth of the computer | title = TED (Technology Entertainment Design) | publisher = TED Conferences, LLC | date = March 2003 | contribution-url = http://www.ted.com/talks/george_dyson_at_the_birth_of_the_computer.html | type = Video | access-date = 2012-03-21 | archive-date = 2012-03-17 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120317114011/http://www.ted.com/talks/george_dyson_at_the_birth_of_the_computer.html | url-status = dead }}
Description
The IAS machine was a binary computer with a 40-bit word, storing two 20-bit instructions in each word. The memory was 1,024 words (5 kilobytes in modern terminology). Negative numbers were represented in two's complement format. It had two general-purpose registers available: the Accumulator (AC) and Multiplier/Quotient (MQ). It used 1,700 vacuum tubes (triode types: 6J6, 5670, 5687, a few diodes: type 6AL5, 150 pentodes to drive the memory CRTs, and 41 CRTs (type: 5CP1A): 40 used as Williams tubes for memory plus one more to monitor the state of a memory tube).[http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/pdf/rand/P-377_The_History_And_Development_Of_The_IAS_Computer_Mar53.pdf The history and development of the electronic computer project at the Institute for Advanced Study. Ware. 1953] The memory was originally designed for about 2,300 RCA Selectron vacuum tubes. Problems with the development of these complex tubes forced the switch to Williams tubes.
It weighed about {{Convert|1000|lb|kg}}.{{Cite web|url=http://ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/BRL-i.html#IAS|title=IAS|last=Weik|first=Martin H.|date=December 1955|website=ed-thelen.org|series=A Survey of Domestic Electronic Digital Computing Systems}}
It was an asynchronous machine, meaning that there was no central clock regulating the timing of the instructions. One instruction started executing when the previous one finished. The addition time was 62 microseconds and the multiplication time was 713 microseconds.
Although some claim the IAS machine was the first design to mix programs and data in a single memory, that had been implemented four years earlier by the 1948 Manchester Baby.{{cite web|url=http://www.computer50.org/mark1/new.baby.html|title=Manchester Baby Computer|url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120604211339/http://www.computer50.org/mark1/new.baby.html|archive-date=2012-06-04}} The Soviet MESM also became operational prior to the IAS machine.
Von Neumann showed how the combination of instructions and data in one memory could be used to implement loops, by modifying branch instructions when a loop was completed, for example. The requirement that instructions, data and input/output be accessed via the same bus later came to be known as the Von Neumann bottleneck.
IAS machine derivatives
Plans for the IAS machine were widely distributed to any schools, businesses, or companies interested in computing machines, resulting in the construction of several derivative computers referred to as "IAS machines", although they were not software compatible.{{cite web |url= http://www.ias.edu/people/vonneumann/ecp/ |title=Electronic Computer Project |publisher=Institute for Advanced Study |access-date=May 26, 2011}}
Some of these "IAS machines" were:{{Cite web|url=http://www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/102693640|title=The IAS computer family scrapbook {{!}} 102693640 {{!}} Computer History Museum|date=2003|website=www.computerhistory.org|language=en|access-date=2018-05-23}}
- AVIDAC (Argonne National Laboratory)
- BESK (Stockholm)
- BESM (Moscow)
- Circle Computer (Hogan Laboratories, Inc.),
- {{cite book |title=Circle Computer: A General-purpose Digital Computer for Science & Engineering. {{!}} Selling the Computer Revolution {{!}} Computer History Museum |url=http://www.computerhistory.org/brochures/doc-4372957177960/ |language=en}}
- {{cite book |title=Circle Computer: The low-cost general-purpose computer for science and industry. {{!}} Selling the Computer Revolution {{!}} Computer History Museum |url=http://www.computerhistory.org/brochures/doc-437295716dd24/ |language=en}}{{cite web |title=Commercially Available General-Purpose Electronic Digital Computers of Moderate Price: THE CIRCLE COMPUTER |url=http://ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/Computers-1952-hand.html#p18}}IAS type machine:
- {{cite journal |title=Automatic Computing Machinery: Technical Developments - THE CIRCLE COMPUTER |journal=Mathematics of Computation |date=1953 |volume=7 |issue=44 |pages=249–255 |doi=10.1090/S0025-5718-53-99352-1 |issn=0025-5718|doi-access=free }} 1954{{Cite web|url=http://ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/BRL-a-d.html#CIRCLE|title=CIRCLE|last=Weik|first=Martin H.|date=Dec 1955|website=ed-thelen.org|series=A Survey of Domestic Electronic Digital Computing Systems}}
- {{cite journal |title=COMPUTERS: 9. The Circle Computer |journal=Digital Computer Newsletter |date=Jan 1954 |volume=6 |issue=1 |pages=5–6 |url=http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/onr/Digital_Computer_Newsletter/ |language=en}}
- {{cite journal |title=COMPUTERS: 13. Circle Computer|journal=Digital Computer Newsletter |date=Jul 1954 |volume=6 |issue=3 |pages=8–9 |url=http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/AD0694613 |language=en}}
- CYCLONE (Iowa State University)
- DASK (Regnecentralen, Copenhagen 1958)
- GEORGE (Argonne National Laboratory)
- IBM 701 (19 installations)
- ILLIAC I (University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign)
- MUSASINO-1 (Musashino, Tokyo, Japan)
- JOHNNIAC (RAND)
- MANIAC I (Los Alamos National Laboratory)
- MISTIC (Michigan State University)
- ORACLE (Oak Ridge National Laboratory)
- ORDVAC (Aberdeen Proving Ground)
- PERM (Munich)Turing's Cathedral, by George Dyson, 2012, p. 287
- SARA (SAAB)
- SEAC (Washington, D.C.)
- SILLIAC (University of Sydney)
- SMIL (Lund University)
- TIFRAC (Tata Institute of Fundamental Research)
- WEIZAC (Weizmann Institute)
See also
References
{{Reflist}}
Further reading
- Gilchrist, Bruce, [https://web.archive.org/web/20061212200023/http://www.columbia.edu/cu/epic/gilchrist_3.07.06.pdf "Remembering Some Early Computers, 1948-1960"], Columbia University EPIC, 2006, pp. 7–9. (archived 2006) Contains some autobiographical material on Gilchrist's use of the IAS computer beginning in 1952.
- Dyson, George, [https://books.google.com/books?id=9nvfmUS03c4C&pg=PA88 Turing's Cathedral], 2012, Pantheon, {{ISBN|0-307-90706-6}} A book about the history of the Institute of Advanced Study around the making of this computer. Chapters 6 onward deal with this computer specifically.
- {{cite journal|title=Automatic Computing Machinery: Technical Developments - THE ELECTRONIC COMPUTER AT THE INSTITUTE FOR ADVANCED STUDY|journal=Mathematics of Computation|date=1953|volume=7|issue=42|pages=108–114|doi=10.1090/S0025-5718-53-99368-5|issn=0025-5718|doi-access=free}}
- {{cite web |title=Documents related to IAS computer |url=http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/ias/ |website=www.bitsavers.org}}
External links
- [http://conservancy.umn.edu/handle/11299/59493/browse?type=subject&order=ASC&rpp=20&value=Institute+for+Advanced+Study+%28Princeton%2C+N.J.%29 Oral history interviews concerning the Institute for Advanced Study]—see also individual interviews with [http://purl.umn.edu/107699 Willis H. Ware], [http://purl.umn.edu/107206 Arthur Burks], [http://purl.umn.edu/107333 Herman Goldstine], [http://purl.umn.edu/107629 Martin Schwarzschild], and others. Charles Babbage Institute, University of Minnesota.
- {{cite book |last = Ware |first = Willis H. |title = The History and Development of the Electronic Computer Project at the Institute for Advanced Study |publisher = RAND |year = 1953 |url = http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/rand/P-377_The_History_And_Development_Of_The_IAS_Computer_Mar53.pdf}}
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20120207162256/http://cva.stanford.edu/classes/cs99s/papers/vonneumann-firstdraftedvac.pdf First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC] – Copy of the original draft by John von Neumann
- Photos: [http://ysfine.com/wigner/neum/vnc01.jpg JvN standing in front of IAS machine] and [http://ysfine.com/wigner/neum/vnc16.jpg another view of IAS machine] from {{cite web |title=CPSC 231 -- Mark Smotherman |url=https://people.cs.clemson.edu/~mark/f08.231.html |website=people.cs.clemson.edu}}
{{CPU technologies}}{{Mainframes}}