Invented by : Blaise Pascal
Invented in year : 1642
Before the invention of the calculators slide rules were used for calculation. Slide Rule is a mechanical calculating tool. The slide rule is used primarily for multiplication and division, and also for scientific purposes such as roots, logarithms and trigonometry. In 1632, the circular and rectangular slide rule was invented by W. Oughtred
William Seward Burroughs invented the First Workable Adding Machine. He was born in rural New York in 1855. There had been a number of earlier prototypes, but in inexperienced users' hands, those that existed would sometimes give incorrect, and at times outrageous, answers. In St. Louis, Missouri in the early 1880s, Burroughs was working for the Boyer Machine Company where he began designing his own adding machine prototype. His design included a "dash pot," or a mechanism that regulated the pull on the machine's handle. He was granted a patent for the device in 1888.
Digital Calculator
Blaise Pascal, the French scientist was one of the most reputed mathematician and physicist of his time. He is credited with inventing an early calculator, amazingly advanced for its time. A genius from a young age, Blaise Pascal composed a treatise on the communication of sounds at the age of twelve, and at the age of sixteen he composed a treatise on conic sections.
In 1642, at the age of 18, Pascal invented and build the first digital calculator as a means of helping his father perform tedious tax accounting. Pascal's father was the tax collector for the township of Rouen. The device was called Pascal's calculator or the Pascaline or the Arithmetique. Pascal continued to make improvements to his design through the next decade and built fifty Pascaline machines in total. The first Pascaline could only handle 5-digit numbers, but later Pascal developed 6 digit and 8 digit versions of the Pascaline.
The calculator had metal wheel dials that were turned to the appropriate numbers using a stylus; the answers appeared in boxes in the top of the calculator. Blaise's calculated was a polished brass box, about 350mm by 125 mm by 75mm. It was compact enough to carry. On the top was a row of eight movable dials, with numerals from 0 to 9, which is use to add a column of up to eight figures.The machine could add, subtract, multiply, and divide. Multiplication and division were somewhat difficult to do, by performing multiplication and division by repeated addition and subtraction.
Electronic Calculator
In 1954, IBM, in the U.S., demonstrated a large all-transistor calculator and, in 1957, the company released the first commercial all-transistor calculator, the IBM 608, though it was housed in several cabinets and cost about $80,000.
The Casio Computer Co., in Japan, released the Model 14-A calculator in 1957, which was the world's first 'All-Electric Compact Calculator'. It did not use electronic logic but was based on relay technology, and was built into a desk.
In October 1961, the world's first 'All-Electronic Desktop Calculator', the Bell Punch/Sumlock Comptometer ANITA (A New Inspiration To Arithmetic/Accounting) was announced. This British designed-and-built machine used vacuum tubes, cold-cathode tubes and Dekatrons in its circuits, with 12 cold-cathode "Nixie"-type tubes for its display.
Handheld Calculator
In December 1966 the team of Kilby, Van Tassel, and Merryman made a working model of First Hand Held Calculator. In 1967 they filed a patent application, which would be issued eight years later. The functional heart of the first miniature calculator was circuitry able to perform addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. It had a small keyboard with 18 keys and a visual output that displayed up to 12 decimal digits.
Role of Calculator in the Improvement Of Human Life
- It is productive tool for learning, especially at a higher level where the basics has been mastered, and more emphasis is placed on concept understanding.
- Saving of time and Accuracy of calculations
- Calculators are source of business as they are widely marketed
