Editing History of computing hardware (section)

===Punched-card data processing===
In 1804, French weaver [[Joseph Marie Jacquard]] developed [[Jacquard loom|a loom]] in which the pattern being woven was controlled by a paper tape constructed from [[punched cards]]. The paper tape could be changed without changing the mechanical design of the loom. This was a landmark achievement in programmability. His machine was an improvement over similar weaving looms. Punched cards were preceded by punch bands, as in the machine proposed by [[Basile Bouchon]]. These bands would inspire information recording for automatic pianos and more recently [[numerical control]] machine tools.

[[File:Early SSA accounting operations.jpg|thumb|upright|left|[[IBM]] punched-card accounting machines, 1936]]
In the late 1880s, the American [[Herman Hollerith]] invented data storage on [[punched card]]s that could then be read by a machine.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.columbia.edu/acis/history/hollerith.html |title=Herman Hollerith |website=Columbia University Computing History |publisher=Columbia University ACIS |access-date=2010-01-30 |archive-date=2011-05-13 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110513134315/http://www.columbia.edu/acis/history/hollerith.html |url-status=live}}</ref> To process these punched cards, he invented the [[tabulating machine|tabulator]] and the [[keypunch]] machine. His machines used electromechanical [[relay]]s and [[Mechanical counter|counters]].<ref>{{cite book|author1-link=Leon E. Truesdell |last=Truesdell |first=Leon E. |title=The Development of Punch Card Tabulation in the Bureau of the Census 1890–1940|pages=47–55 |year=1965 |publisher=US GPO}}</ref> Hollerith's method was used in the [[1890 United States census]].<!-- The Census Bureau is not "an independent 3rd party" source – as required by Wikipedia – for Census Bureau performance claims. FOLLOWING CLAIM DELETED. -> and the completed results were "... finished months ahead of schedule and far under budget".<ref>{{cite web |title=Tabulation and Processing – History – U.S. Census Bureau |first=Jason |last=Gauthier |url=https://www.census.gov/history/www/innovations/technology/tabulation_and_processing.html |access-date=11 August 2015}}</ref>--> That census was processed two years faster than the prior census had been.<ref name="11th census report">{{cite book |title=Report of the Commissioner of Labor In Charge of The Eleventh Census to the Secretary of the Interior for the Fiscal Year Ending June 30, 1895 |location=Washington, DC |publisher=[[United States Government Publishing Office]] |date=29 July 1895 |oclc=867910652|hdl=2027/osu.32435067619882 |page=9}} "You may confidently look for the rapid reduction of the force of this office after the 1st of October, and the entire cessation of clerical work during the present calendar year. ... The condition of the work of the Census Division and the condition of the final reports show clearly that the work of the Eleventh Census will be completed at least two years earlier than was the work of the Tenth Census." — Carroll D. Wright, Commissioner of Labor in Charge</ref> Hollerith's company eventually became the core of [[International Business Machines|IBM]].

By 1920, electromechanical tabulating machines could add, subtract, and print accumulated totals.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.ibm.com/ibm/history/history/year_1920.html |website=IBM Archives |title=1920 |date=23 January 2003 |access-date=2020-12-01 |archive-date=2020-10-29 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201029080349/https://www.ibm.com/ibm/history/history/year_1920.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Machine functions were directed <!-- other than the calculators (602, 604...) unit record machines are not programmed – there is no sequence of operations on their control panels. See [[plugboard]]--> by inserting dozens of wire jumpers into removable [[plugboard|control panel]]s. When the United States instituted [[Social Security (United States)|Social Security]] in 1935, IBM punched-card systems were used to process records of 26 million workers.<ref>{{cite web |url= https://www.ibm.com/ibm/history/history/decade_1930.html |website=IBM Archives |title=Chronological History of IBM: 1930s |date=23 January 2003 |access-date=2020-12-01 |archive-date=2020-12-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201203145246/https://www.ibm.com/ibm/history/history/decade_1930.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Punched cards became ubiquitous in industry and government for accounting and administration.

[[Leslie Comrie]]'s articles on punched-card methods<ref>Leslie Comrie [https://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1928MNRAS..88..506C (1928) On the Construction of Tables by Interpolation]</ref> and [[W. J. Eckert]]'s publication of ''Punched Card Methods in Scientific Computation'' in 1940, described punched-card techniques sufficiently advanced to solve some differential equations or perform multiplication and division using floating-point representations, all on punched cards and [[unit record equipment|unit record machines]].{{sfn|Eckert|1935}} Such machines were used during World War II for cryptographic statistical processing,<ref>{{citation | editor-last = Erskine | editor-first = Ralph | editor2-last = Smith | editor2-first = Michael | editor2-link = Michael Smith (newspaper reporter) | title = The Bletchley Park Codebreakers | publisher = Biteback Publishing Ltd | year = 2011 | page = 134| isbn = 978-184954078-0}} Updated and extended version of ''Action This Day: From Breaking of the Enigma Code to the Birth of the Modern Computer'' Bantam Press 2001</ref> as well as a vast number of administrative uses. The Astronomical Computing Bureau of [[Columbia University]] performed astronomical calculations representing the state of the art in [[computing]].<ref>{{cite web |author=Frank da Cruz |title=A Chronology of Computing at Columbia University |website=Columbia University Computing History |publisher=Columbia University |url=https://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/#timeline |access-date=2023-08-31|archive-date=2023-08-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230822234349/http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/#timeline |url-status=live}}</ref>{{sfn|Eckert|1940|pp=101–114}}