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Long back the creation of computer seemed impossible when it's just logic, a simple switch, on and off. In today's modern era, we use computers from waking up to the alarm in the morning to everywhere. Looking around in our surroundings, we can easily say that computers have become a very important aspect of our lives.

The computers used these days are not the exact version, of what was invented. Evolution of computers has been divided into 6 main generations as following:

First generation: Vacuum tube based.(1946-59)

Second  generation: Transistor based.(1959-65)

Third generation:  Integrated circuit based.(1965-71)

Fourth generation:VLSI  microprocessor  based.(1971-80)

Fifth generation:ULSI microprocessor based.(1980 till date)

Sixth generation: Artificial Intelligence .(1990 till date and the future)

(www.tutorialspoint.com, 2018)

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As the name "History of computers" suggests we will be discussing the past of computers,but first, lets quickly revise the definition of a "computer". It's an electronic device that receives information in a suitable format and performs operations on it and finally outputs a result using a combination of hardware and software.(SearchWindowsServer, 2018)

Back in the Victorian period, the word "computer" was used to define an occupation, it consisted of people employed to carry out mathematical calculations.(Campbell-Kelly et al., 2004)

But a human is a human, as obvious as is sounds there were mistakes made. In the 19th century, a mathematician named 'Charles Babbage' introduced a concept of Digital Programmable Computer.  He is also known as the father of the computer.
Before the invention of computers, a device called an abacus was used to perform actual calculations, which now is usually seen in playrooms for kids to learn how to count, this is how the invention of computers has affected our lives. Computers only existed in imagination, what once seemed impossible now seems the most commonly used thing, that it's taken for granted by us.
Today, computers are capable of amazing tasks, it can send an Email or a message from one to another, and also can send a human into space. It's also referred to as a "thinking machine".

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Campbell-Kelly, M., Aspray, W., Yost, J. and Ensmenger, N. (2004). Computer : A History of the Information Machine. 2nd ed. Westview Press.
SearchWindowsServer. (2018). What is computer? - Definition from WhatIs.com. [online] Available at: http://searchwindowsserver.techtarget.com/definition/computer
[Accessed 9 Feb. 2018].
www.tutorialspoint.com. (2018). Computer First Generation. [online] Available at: https://www.tutorialspoint.com/computer_fundamentals/computer_first_generation.htm
[Accessed 9 Feb. 2018].
Myreadingroom.co.in. (2018). Generations of Computers. [online] Available at: http://www.myreadingroom.co.in/notes-and-studymaterial/67-fit/598-generations-of-computers.html
[Accessed 12 Feb. 2018].
www.tutorialspoint.com. (2018). Computer Third Generation. [online] Available at: https://www.tutorialspoint.com/computer_fundamentals/computer_third_generation.htm
[Accessed 12 Feb. 2018].
Byte-Notes | Computer Science learning platform. (2018). Five Generations of Computers. [online] Available at:
http://www.byte-notes.com/five-generations-computers
[Accessed 12 Feb. 2018].
Marker, G. (2018). The sixth generation of computers - Easy Tech Now. [online] Easy Tech Now. Available at: https://easytechnow.com/learn-technology/the-sixth-generation-of-computers/ [Accessed 10 Feb. 2018].
WhatIs.com. (2018). What is transistor? - Definition from WhatIs.com. [online] Available at: http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/transistor [Accessed 11 Feb. 2018].

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The 6th generation is the era of intelligent computers.This present and future generation of artificial intelligence does not have a completely different base or a different technology,but it is definitely a more improved one,this generation introduces to many high performance computers developing and enhancing the concept of parallel computing that is: processing  takes place concurrently for many calculations.Computers belonging to this generation claim to increase up to  2.5% productivity and three times of battery life than a normal personal computer. It also claims to have better  graphics and provides with security with a new technology of protecting the user’s identity. It provides with wireless capabilities hence making Wide Area Networking even more feasible. Energy and electricity is also saved by this generation compared to the previous five generations. It wouldn’t be much of a shocking claim to say that soon the unexpected will also be possible in this world. There might come a time when all the jobs are or at least the common jobs now being performed by the human beings are done by the robots. (Marker, 2018)The computer’s performance would be about thirty times that of the normal 4th to 5th generation computers.

An example:

6th Gen Intel Core i7

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This generation works with a small silicon chip on which thousands of circuits were integrated and  placed,known as a microprocessor. Many transistors are combined in order to form a microprocessor  that is ICs with VLSI(Very Large Scale Integration). There was a vast decrease in power consumption in the 4th generation,less electricity was used leading to less heat production. Computers also became smaller.The storage capacity also increased upto several  Gigabytes. Most importantly,languages like C,C++,and Java were developed in this generation.Since,these computers were very powerful,they could be linked together to form networking and hence,there was development of the Internet.Mouse was also introduced followed by more hand held devices. Magnetic disks and floppy were used as storage media.

Some examples from the 4th generation are:

·         Intel 4004

·         Apple

·         IBM-370

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This generation was based on transistors, the vacuum tubes were replaced by transistors and there was a great development in technology compared to the first generation. A transistor is a device that regulates current or voltage flow and acts as a switch or gate for electronic signals.(WhatIs.com, 2018)Electrical energy was used in this generation too but it was less in comparison to the 1st generation. This setup was cheaper.The size of the computer  also got smaller. One of the biggest developments was the fact that a user  was able to interact with the machine using  High level programming  languages which are people-friendly such as FORTRAN and COBOL in this generation. Heat production was less, and the  computer  processed  faster. The memory also increased when compared with vacuum tubes based  computers. Punch cards were used for input and print outs were used as output sources. Magnetic  tapes were used for storage purposes. Magnetic disks were also introduced in this generation.

An example:

IBM-1401

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This generation is still in process from 1980 to present. According to  (www.tutorialspoint.com, 2018) this generation uses the ULSI (Ultra Large Scale Integration) technology, this results in the production of microprocessor chips which consists about 10 million electronic components.According to (Byte-Notes | Computer Science learning platform, 2018)  it is also based on the technology of Artificial intelligence (AI) and also use optic fibre to handle robotics, expert systems etc. They have very high processing speeds and are very reliable to use.
According to (www.tutorialspoint.com, 2018) the following desktops are the examples of the 5th gen:

Desktop

Laptop

NoteBook

UltraBook

ChromeBook

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The third generation lasted from 1965 to 1971.
In this generation the transistors were replaced by integrated circuits (ic's). The IC's were developed by Jack Kilby in the year 1958.
A single IC chip consisted of thousands of transistors. This development made computers more reliable,  smaller in size and more efficient. The heat emission also reduced by a great extent. Still these computers required AC rooms and were fairly expensive.
(Myreadingroom.co.in, 2018)
According to (www.tutorialspoint.com, 2018) these are some of the examples of the 3rd gen computers:

IBM-360 series

Honeywell-6000 series

PDP (Personal Data Processor)

IBM-370/168

TDC-316

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The first generation lasted from 1946 to 1959.
This generation used Vacuum tubes as its main components or the memory and CPU, as vacuum tubes were the only technology present in that era.
These tubes were developed by John Ambrose Fleming in 1904.
Vacuum tubes are used to amplify a signal by controlling the electron movement in a vacuumed space.
The programming language used by this generation was 0s and 1s (i.e. the binary language.)  so these were very difficult to program and work on.
(www.tutorialspoint.com, 2018)
These computers were enormous in size (also termed as room-sized computers) and produced a lot of heat so large air conditioned rooms were required to these set up.
This made these computers really expensive to maintain and setup and so were only affordable by large organizations.
One of the first gen computers is:
1) ENIAC
(Electronic Numerical Integrator and Calculator)
This was the first electronic calculator build in 1946 at University of Pennsylvania, USA by John Eckert and John Mauchy. It was huge in size and weighted 30 tons. (Myreadingroom.co.in, 2018)
According to (www.tutorialspoint.com, 2018) Other examples of first generation computers would be:

EDVAC

UNIVAC

IBM-701

IBM-650