Ada Lovelace recognized that Babbage's Analytical Engine could manipulate symbols, not just numbers

Grace Hopper invented the first compiler and coined the term 'debugging' after finding an actual moth in a relay

Grace Hopper invented the first compiler, coined 'debugging' after finding a moth in a relay

Universal Turing machine

Alan Turing introduced the Turing machine in 1936

Colossus computer

Colossus, 1943: first programmable computer to decrypt Nazi codes

History of the Hindu–Arabic numeral system

The word 'algorithm' originates from al-Khwarizmi, a 9th-century Persian mathematician

Software bug

First computer bug: A moth in Harvard Mark II, 1947

Richard Feynman's diagrams turned quantum field theory calculations from intractable algebra into picture-bookkeeping

Feynman diagrams simplified quantum field theory from complex algebra to visual bookkeeping