The 1940s :: Technology and Computing's Pioneers

• 1940 :: The first remote computer was introduced when the Complex Number Calculator was demonstrated at Dartmouth College.
• 1943 :: Colossus becomes operational. It is the first working electronic deciphering device.
• 1944 :: The Harvard Mark I is introduced at Harvard University. It was built by Howard Aiken and IBM.
• 1945 :: September 9th, 15:45 hrs. Rear Admiral Grace Hopper records the first computer bug, a moth that got stuck inside one of the relays of the Harvard Mark II Computer. Hopper eventually went on to help invent COBOL. The first outline of the architecture of a stored-program computer was done by John Von Neumann, in his "First Draft of a Report on EDVAC" The idea was that electronic storage would eliminate the need for such things as punched paper tape.
• 1946 :: : ENIAC is unveiled at the University of Pennsylvania.
• 1947 :: The first successful test of the point contact resistor occurs, creating a revolution in semiconductors. It would later replace the use of vacuum tubes in computers. The BINAC computer is constructed by the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corp., a fledgling company formed by John Eckert and John Mauchly.
• 1948 :: Claude Shannon introduces the bit , the basic component of computation. He also figured out how to code data to verify accuracy after transmission between computers. Norbert Wiener publishes "Cybernetics" , revolutionizing the study of artificial intelligence
• 1949 :: The Manchester Baby Machine functions as a complete system using the Williams tube for memory. It is the world's first stored program computer. To this day there are programs designed as simulators to emulate it. Thomas Watson, Jr. predicts that all moving parts in machines will be replaced by electronics in a decade. Austrailia's first digitial computer, the CSIRAC is activated.