Computers drive the modern world in ways that we could never have foreseen at the beginning of the twentieth century. When Charles Babbage created his Thinking Machine or Difference Engine in 1819 he could not have imagined the impact that it would have some one hundred or even two hundred years later. The machine was only fully made to his specifications by the Science Museum in London some years ago and it is able to perform the calculations that Babbage set out. This is the first true basis of the computer but Babbage himself acknowledged that he was influenced by even earlier creations like the Antikythera mechanism developed in ancient Greece and in 1784 the German J H Muller had developed a calculating machine for the Hessian Army.
Babbage’s ideas were never taken forward even in the cut and thrust of the Victorian Empire where all was thought to be possible. However they were picked up out of necessity by the genius Alan Turing in his quest to break the German secret codes during World War Two. He realised that the only way such a complicated code could be broken via the enigma machine was to construct a device that could calculate the possibilities.
Computers after this began to play a major role in business and government. The first computers were the size of a small room, ran on an analogue punch card and had the abilities of a modern pocket calculator. This was only the beginning and the technology they have given us has enabled us to build better versions that we use today. We still need a Computer Repairs Gloucester based company like Cotswold Computer Medic to come and fix them.