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Computer Supplies Fast Facts, Last Updated:09/06/2010 The first electronic digital computers, with their large size
and cost, mainly performed scientific calculations, often to
support military objectives. The ENIAC was originally designed to calculate ballistics
firing tables for artillery, but it was also used to calculate
neutron cross-sectional densities to help in the design of the
hydrogen
bomb. This calculation, performed in December, 1945 through January, 1946
and involving over a million punch cards of data, showed the design then under consideration would
fail. (Many of the most powerful supercomputers available today are also
used for nuclear weapons simulations.) The CSIR Mk I, the first Australian stored-program computer, evaluated
rainfall patterns for the catchment area of the Snowy Mountains
Scheme, a large hydroelectric generation project. Others were
used in cryptanalysis, for example the world's first
programmable (though not general-purpose) digital electronic
computer, Colossus,
built during World War II. Despite this early focus of
scientific applications, computers were quickly used in other
areas. |
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