[Ads-l] Antedating of "Software" (OED 2.b.)

[Shapiro, Fred]

About 25 years ago I discovered the earliest known use of "software" in its basic reference to computers.  This usage was in an article by the great statistician John W. Tukey, who also coined the term "bit."  (Paul Niquette's vociferous claim that he introduced "software" in 1953 is wholly unsubstantiated.)  When Tukey died, the New York Times obituary headlined his coinage of "software," so that now that is what he is principally remembered for, despite his many more substantive achievements..

OED has a sense 2.b. of "software": "Programs designed to enable a computer to perform a particular task or series of tasks."  Their first use for this specific sense is dated 1969.  I do not understand why 1969 is the first use, when their entry for "application software" has a 1961 citation.

Fred Shapiro


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