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Wikipedia:WikiProject Computing/Early computers task force/Generations

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I use the following mental model of the "generations" of early electronic computers (the mechanical ones are a whole hierarchy unto themselves):

Anything after that can't possibly be called an "early" computer!

Note: Machines are listed for illustrative purposes only - this list is not by any means intended to be a comprehensive list of all the machines of any particular generation.


  • Note that these categories of early computers conflict with what are generally called the computer generations: 1 = tubes, 2 = transistors, 3 = integrated circuits, 4 = microchips. I think they should be called something different to avoid confusion. Something such as zeroth=1A, first=1B, second=1C, third=1D, fourth=2A, etc.

--Bubba73 18:53, 26 May 2005 (UTC) Also, the Harvard Mark I and IBM SSEC sould probably be included as your "zeroth", changing the ones following, making the first all-electronic ones the "first". Bubba73 July 6, 2005 15:11 (UTC)[reply]


I'd suggest that the Colossus computer article is not mis-named, because the Colossi were definitely digital (partly) electronic computing machines. They were also programmable to a limited extent. What they were not was either general purpose or Turing-complete.

As with the original version of ENIAC, Colossus was not software programmable.

86.141.196.130 (talk) 23:10, 5 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]