[Ads-l] antedating of "analogue"

[James A. Landau]

Letter from John W. Mauchly to John V. Atanasoff, dated February 24, 1941, exhibit PX 699 in Honeywell v. Sperry Rand, quoted in Alice R. Burks and Arthur W. Burks _The First Electronic Computer: The Atanasoff Story_ Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1988, ISBN 0-472-10090-4, page 123 quoted again on page 160

"...do you consider the usual d. [differential] analyzer an "analogue" machine?"

Also a draft paper by Mauchly, written in August 1941 (exhibit PX 847, quoted in Burks and Burks page 160) has as the title of its opening section "Analog versus impulse types" with a footnote "I am indebted to Dr. J. V. Atanasoff of Iowa State College for the classification and terminology here explained."

It would appear that Mauchly heard the term "analogue" from Atanasoff, perhaps in his first meeting with Atanasoff on December 28, 1940 (Burks and Burks page 75).

It is worth noting that Burks and Burks (page 263) state "it was Atanasoff who first distinguished explicitly between analog and digital devices and, in fact, provided the name that came to be associated with the former.

- Jim Landau

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