Expensive Desk Calculator: Difference between revisions

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{{short description|Computer program}}

[[Image:Restored-PDP-1.jpg|thumb|PDP-1|200px|right|DEC PDP-1 image courtesy [http://www.computerhistory.org/ Computer History Museum]]]

{{Infobox Software

'''Expensive Desk Calculator''' by [[Robert A. Wagner]] is thought to be [[computing]]'s first interactive calculation program.<ref name="Kotok">[[Alan Kotok]] ([[15 May]] [[2006]]). [http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4995476926708958999&q=computer+history+dec The Mouse That Roared: PDP-1 Celebration Event Lecture]. Computer History Museum (Google Video link). Retrieved on [[22 June]] [[2006]]. Kotok's description begins at 1:02.</ref>

[[da:| name = Expensive Desk Calculator]]

| logo =

| screenshot = PDP-1.jpg

| screenshot alt= Restored PDP-1 with monitor and keyboard

| caption = DEC [[PDP-1]] at the [[Computer History Museum]]

| author = Robert A. Wagner

| developer =

| released = 1960s

| latest release version =

| latest release date =

| latest preview version =

| latest preview date =

| operating system =

| platform = [[TX-0]], [[PDP-1]]

| language =

| genre = [[Calculator]]

| license =

| website = [http://www.computerhistory.org/pdp-1/ PDP-1 Restoration Project]

}}

'''Expensive Desk Calculator''' by [[Robert A. Wagner]] is thought to be [[computing]]'s first interactive calculation program.<ref name="Kotok">[[Alan Kotok]] ([[15 May]] [[2006]]). [http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4995476926708958999&q=computer+history+dec The Mouse That Roared: PDP-1 Celebration Event Lecture]. Computer History Museum (Google Video link). Retrieved on [[22 June]] [[2006]]. Kotok's description begins at 1:02.</ref>

The software first ran on the [[TX-0]] computer loaned to the [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]] (MIT) by [[Lincoln Laboratory]]. It was ported to the [[PDP-1]] donated to MIT in 1961 by [[Digital Equipment Corporation]].<ref>[[Robert M. Slade]] ([[26 January]] [[1994]]). [http://victoria.tc.ca/int-grps/books/techrev/bkdecwrk.rvw BKDECWRK.RVW: Review of "Digital At Work", Pearson, 1992]. Retrieved on [[22 June]] [[2006]]</ref>

Friends from the MIT [[Tech Model Railroad Club]], Wagner and a group of fellow students had access to these room-sized machines outside classes, signing up for time during off hours. Overseen by [[Jack Dennis]], John McKenzie and faculty advisors, they were [[personal computer]] users as early as the late 1950s.<ref name="Kotok" />

The [[calculators]] Wagner needed to complete his [[numerical analysis]] homework were across campus and in short supply so he wrote one himself. Although the program has about three thousand lines of code and took months to write, Wagner received a grade of zero on his homework. His professor's reaction was, "You used a computer! This ''can't'' be right." [[Steven Levy]] wrote, "The professor would learn in time, as would everyone, that the world opened up by the computer was a limitless one."<ref>Steven Levy (1984). [[Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution]] ({{ISBN |0-385-19195-2}}) retrieved on [[22 June]] [[2006]] at [httphttps://www.gutenberg.org/etextebooks/729 Project Gutenberg], [http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?pageno=33&fk_files=36095 p. 33]</ref><ref name=Levybook>{{cite book

| last = Levy

| first = Steven

| title = Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution

| url =

| yeardate = Updated [[2 January]], [[2001]]

| publisher = Penguin (Non-Classics)

| idisbn = ISBN 0-141014-0051100051-1

}}</ref>

== References ==

<references />

==See also==

* [[PDP-1]]

* [[Expensive Typewriter]]

* [[Expensive Planetarium]]

* [[Expensive Tape Recorder]]

* [[Expensive Planetarium]]

* [[Colossal Typewriter]]

==Notes and references==

<references />

[[Category:Calculators]]

[[Category:History of software]]

[[da:Expensive Desk Calculator]]

{{software-stub}}