Google celebrated a true tech pioneer with a Monday Doodle commemorating the 197th birthday of Ada King, the Countess of Lovelace — more commonly known as Ada Lovelace.
Lovelace is often credited with being the first computer programmer. She worked with Charles Babbage, who laid out the plans for the Difference Engine and Analytical Engine — two machines designed to store numbers and data that were the forerunners to the modern computer.
Lovelace was the daughter of the poet Lord Byron, though her parents separated shortly after her birth. She was raised by her mother, Annabelle Milbanke Byron, described by the Encyclopedia Britannica as “mathematically inclined” and determined to raise Lovelace with a focus on the sciences to combat whatever artistic temperament she may have inherited from her father.
At the age of 17, Lovelace was among the first to grasp the importance of Babbage’s machines, Google noted. In her correspondence, as reported by New Scientist magazine, Lovelace said that “the Analytical Engine weaves algebraical patterns just as the Jacquard-loom weaves flowers and leaves.” She also noted that the Analytical Engine “does not occupy common ground with mere calculating machines” and had the potential to run complicated programs of its own.Read more
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| Google celebrates Ada Lovelace, who, the company notes in a blog post published… (Designed by Kevin Laughlin/Courtesy…) |
