Limit search to available items
Book Cover
E-book
Author Essinger, James, 1957-

Title Jacquard's web : how a hand-loom led to the birth of the information age / by James Essinger
Published Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2007, ©2004

Copies

Description 1 online resource (xi, 302 pages) : illustrations
Contents List of illustrations; 1 The engraving that wasn't; 2 A better mousetrap; 3 The son of a master-weaver; 4 The Emperor's new clothes; 5 From weaving to computing; 6 The Difference Engine; 7 The Analytical Engine; 8 A question of faith and funding; 9 The lady who loved the Jacquard loom; 10 A crisis with the American Census; 11 The first Jacquard looms that wove information; 12 The birth of IBM; 13 The Thomas Watson phenomenon; 14 Howard Aiken dreams of a computer; 15 IBM and the Harvard Mark 1; 16 Weaving at the speed of light; 17 The future; Appendix 1: Charles Babbage's vindication
Appendix 2: Ada Lovelace's letter to Charles Babbage, 14 August 1843Appendix 3: How the Jacquard loom worked; Acknowledgements; Notes on sources; Bibliography; Index;
Summary Jacquard's Web tells one of the greatest untold stories of science: how a hand loom invented in Napoleonic France led to the birth of the modern computer age. James Essinger, a master storyteller, traces the 200-year evolution of Jacquard's idea from the studios of 18th century weavers, through the Industrial Revolution to the development of hi-tech computers and the information age today. - ;Jacquard's Web is the story of some of the most ingenious inventors the world has ever known, a fascinating account of how a hand-loom invented in Napoleonic France led to the development of the modern in
Notes Originally published: 2004
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 289-293) and index
Notes English
Print version record
Subject Jacquard, Joseph-Marie, 1752-1834.
SUBJECT Jacquard, Joseph-Marie, 1752-1834 fast
Subject Computing -- History
Calculators.
Jacquard knitting machines.
Information technology -- History
calculators.
COMPUTERS -- History.
Calculators
Information technology
Jacquard knitting machines
Genre/Form History
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9780191517259
0191517259
1281346543
9781281346544
9786611346546
6611346546
0192805770
9780192805775