Innovation Poll

The Science Museum and other similarly distinguished organisations have recently held a poll to determine the most important British innovation of the last 100 years. Turing's notion of the "universal" computer was voted first out of 87 with the World Wide Web coming in at number six.

More details here.

Harwell Decatron ReBoot

After a three-year restoration project at The National Museum of Computing, the Harwell Dekatron (aka WITCH) computer was rebooted on 20^th November 2012 to become the world's oldest original working digital computer.

Now in its seventh decade and in its fifth home, the computer with its flashing lights and clattering printers and readers provides an awe-inspiring display for visiting school groups and the general public keen to learn about our rich computer heritage.

The 2.5 tonne, 1951 computer from Harwell with its 828 flashing Dekatron valves, 480 relays and a bank of paper tape readers clattered back into action in the presence of two of the original designers, one of its first users and many others who have admired it at different times during its remarkable history.

Kevin Murrell, trustee of TNMOC who initiated the restoration project, said: "In 1951 the Harwell Dekatron was one of perhaps a dozen computers in the world, and since then it has led a charmed life surviving intact while its contemporaries were recycled or destroyed. As the world's oldest original working digital computer, it provides a wonderful contrast to our Rebuild of the wartime Colossus, the world's first semi-programmable electronic computer."

The Harwell Dekatron computer first ran at Harwell Atomic Energy Research Establishment in 1951 where it automated the tedious calculations performed by talented young people using mechanical hand calculators. Designed for reliability rather than speed, it could carry on relentlessly for days at a time delivering its error-free results. It wasn't even binary, but worked in decimal -- a feature that is beautifully displayed by its flashing Dekatron valves.

By 1957, the computer had become redundant at Harwell, but an imaginative scientist at the atomic establishment arranged a competition to offer it to the educational establishment putting up the best case for its continued use. Wolverhampton and Staffordshire Technical College won, renamed it the WITCH (Wolverhampton Instrument for Teaching Computation from Harwell) and used it in computer education until 1973.

After a period on display in the former Birmingham Museum of Science and Industry, it was dismantled and put into storage, but "rediscovered" by a team of volunteers from The National Museum of Computing in 2008. With the blessing of the Birmingham museum and in conjunction with the Computer Conservation Society, the team developed a plan to restore the machine and to put it once again to educational use at TNMOC.

Kevin Murrell recalls its rediscovery: "I first encountered the Harwell Dekatron as a teenager in the 1970s when it was on display in the Birmingham Museum of Science and Industry -- and I was captivated by it. When that Museum closed, it disappeared from public view, but four years ago quite by chance I caught a glimpse of its control panel in a photograph of stored equipment. That sparked our ideas to rescue it and we hunted it down."

"The TNMOC restoration team has done a superb job to get it working again and it is already proving to be a fascination to young and old alike. To see it in action is to watch the inner workings of a computer -- something that is impossible on the machines of today. The restoration has been in full public view and even before it was working again the interest from the public was enormous."

Delwyn Holroyd, a TNMOC volunteer who led the restoration team, said: "The restoration was quite a challenge requiring work with components like valves, relays and paper tape readers that are rarely seen these days and are certainly not found in modern computers. Older members of the team had to brush up on old skills while younger members had to learn from scratch!"

Here is a report from the BBC news website featuring Kevin and Delwyn talking about the machine.

You can find more information on the machine here.

Tony Sale Award 2012

The Tony Sale Award, sponsored by Google, was set up to recognise singular engineering achievements in the area of computer conservation achievements in the growing area of computer conservation. The first Award was presented at a ceremony held on 11th October, at the BCS, London.

The winning project is the Ferranti Mark 1 LoveLetters, reconstruction of software for text generation submitted by Dr David Link who is based in Cologne.

This computer art installation is a functional replica of the 1951 Ferranti Mark 1 computer.

David Link reconstructed software developed by one of the very first software developers. In 1953-1954, using the programming system devised by Alan Turing, Christopher Strachey used the built-in random generator of the Ferranti Mark 1 to generate texts intended to express and arouse emotions - or, automated 'love letters'.

The project's fusion of art, engineering and history celebrates one of the first artistic applications of the computer in a visually attractive way. It is conceptually brilliant and technically impressive in its research and reconstruction, with wide cultural appeal, originality and a touch of genius.

Even more details here.

Pegasus arises

Wonderful news from Len Hewett, Project Leader for Pegasus. He writes:

We had our first switch on of Pegasus for 3¼ years yesterday. Peter Burton the engineer the Science Museum is employing to prove the machine is safe to run needed to have the machine running for a couple of hours for him to record temperatures and voltages in various areas. Chris Burton, Peter Holland, Rod Brown and I attended from the C.C.S. with Charlotte Connelly from the Science Museum. We had some minor problems which were overcome. One was a fuse blowing episode in the CPU caused by the back wiring being disturbed in cleaning but this was rectified. We ran with HT on for over an hour with some packages unplugged just to check voltages and temperatures. Then, after some minor repairs, we ran for another hour with all packages in and we were able to do drum transfers, execute instructions on the hand switches and Start And Run attempted to read paper tape from the Tape Reader. The machine appears to be 95% working. The air conditioning engineers need to gas up the system and we are trying to persuade the Museum to let us do this before I leave on the 1^st November as the air conditioning engineers need power on to gas up the system.

We were all delighted at the progress and it speaks volumes about the initial design of the system.

Meanwhile members will also be interested to hear that a new book on Pegasus by Hugh McGregor Ross and Colleagues has just been published. Entitled "Pegasus The Seminal Early Computer" it traces the ancestry of the design back to Elliotts and forward to the ICT 1900. Full of technical detail, it costs a modest £9.95.

Tony Sale 1931-2011

The CCS is sad to announce the death of Tony Sale. Tony was a founder member of the CCS and has been a committee member since. Tony is of course most well known for his rebuilding of the Colossus code-breaking computer at Bletchley Park.

There is more information of the National Museum of Computing's web site here, and on the BBC here.

Computer Conservation Society Projects feature in royal visit to Bletchley Park

On Friday 15 July, the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh visited Bletchley Park to meet some of the veterans involved in the World War II code-breaking achievements. As part of the visit, the Bombe reconstruction was demonstrated to the Queen by Jean Valentine, one of the veterans who regularly shows the machine to visitors; while John Harper, leader of the Bombe team, explained about the machine's reconstruction to the Duke of Edinburgh. The visit also included a visit to the National Museum of Computing which included a demonstration of the Colossus rebuild by Tony Sale.

Britain’s largest celebration of vintage computing is to be held at The National Museum of Computing (TNMOC)
in Bletchley Park from 19-20 June 2010.

Vintage Computing Festivals originated ten years ago in California’s Silicon Valley to celebrate our computing heritage, and are now regular events held across the USA and in Germany. The June 2010 event at TNMOC will be the first in the UK and will pay particular tribute to the British contribution to the development of computing. The festival is open to all, and will be of particular interest to CCS members. The event includes many exhibition stands, a full lecture programme, machine demonstrations, computer games and challenges, bring-and-buy sale, and performances of electronic music.
For more and for up-to-date details see www.tnmoc.org/vcf-gb.aspx.

We have decided to reschedule our CCS event marking the 50th anniversary of the Pegasus computer in the Science Museum from December to May 2010. There is a risk that the repairs would not be completed in time - see the following statement from the Science Museum.

"On Wednesday 29th July 2009 there was a small electrical fire in the Pegasus computer during its demonstration by CCS volunteers on gallery. As a result of the incident all demonstrations of the Ferranti Pegasus computer, and the 401 working party at Blythe House, are currently suspended. The museum is conducting a formal investigation into the actions of staff post incident, the management of hazards, particularly asbestos within the Museum's collection, and the supervision and training of volunteers. At the end of this investigation a report will be completed, so that NMSI management can have complete assurance that any future activities of the CCS or other operators are planned, operated and supervised within legal requirements of Health and Safety and NMSI Health and Safety policy. CCS volunteers are thanked for their patience and cooperation during the investigation and in the implementation of its outcomes."

CCS Founder honoured - Dr Doron Swade awarded a MBE for services to the History of Computing.

Doron Swade inspired the founding of the Computer Conservation Society, and has been on our committee since the birth of the Society in 1989.

Doron is best known for his research and leadership on projects to build historically accurate 'Babbage Engines' - for more see a recent BBC news item.

Doron's recent work on exhibiting and communicating the overall history of computing was then topic of a recent talk to the Society - and stimulated much discussion among members.

The Society congratulates Doron on this award.

David Caminer - Computer Systems Pioneer and personality - died 19th June aged 92

The Leo Society website has a news item with links to a number of obituaries.

Other events open to CCS members

9th July National Archive of Educational Computing event in London - New Learning '08 - Connecting the Future to the Past - free but booking required.

13th July Visit the restored ICT 1301 computer - a working second generation mainframe from the 1962 era, on public display in a barn at a classic car show in Kent - click here for details - see the end of the introductory paragraph.

22nd - 24th July BCS Computer Arts Society Specialist Group - EVA London 2008 conference on Electronic Visualisation and the Arts at the BCS Southampton Street, London - booking required.