BARK(Swedish:Binär Aritmetisk (Automatisk) Relä-Kalkylator,lit. 'Binary Arithmetic (Automatic) Relay Calculator') was an earlyelectromechanical computer.BARK was built using standardtelephone relays,implementing a32-bitbinary machine. It could perform addition in 150 ms and multiplication in 250 ms. It had a memory with 50registersand 100 constants. It was later expanded to double the memory.Howard Aikenstated in reference to BARK "This is the first computer I have seen outside Harvard that actually works."
History
editBARK was developed byMatematikmaskinnämnden(Swedish Board for Computing Machinery) a few years beforeBESK.The machine was built with 8,000 standard telephone relays, 80 km of cable and with 175,000 soldering points. Programming was done byplugboard.[1][2][3]It was completed in February 1950[4][5]at a cost of 400,000Swedish kronor(less than $100,000),[6]became operational on April 28, 1950, and was taken offline on September 22, 1954. The engineers on the team led byConny Palmwere Harry Freese, Gösta Neovius, Olle Karlqvist, Carl-Erik Fröberg, G. Kellberg, Björn Lind, Arne Lindberger, P. Petersson and Madeline Wallmark.
See also
edit- BESK- Binär Elektronisk Sekvens-Kalkylator - Sweden's second computer.
- Elsa-Karin Boestad-Nilsson,a programmer on BARK and BESK
- SMIL- SifferMaskinen I Lund (The Number Machine in Lund)
- History of computing hardware
References
edit- ^Mathematics of Computation 1951,p. 32: "No instructions are given to the machine from tapes or similar devices; all programs are physically realized by the plugged connections."
- ^Edwards, Paul N. (2010-03-12).A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming.MIT Press. p. 129.ISBN9780262290715.
- ^"12. Digital Computers in Sweden".Digital Computer Newsletter.2(1): 4. 1950-01-01.Archivedfrom the original on March 11, 2021.
- ^Goldstine, Herman H. (2008-09-02).The Computer from Pascal to von Neumann.Princeton University Press. p. 350.ISBN978-1400820139.
- ^Research, United States Office of Naval (1953).A survey of automatic digital computers.Office of Naval Research, Dept. of the Navy. p.8.
- ^"13. BARK Computer, Sweden".Digital Computer Newsletter.2(2): 4. 1950-05-01.
- "Automatic Computing Machinery: Technical Developments - The BARK, A Swedish General Purpose Relay Computer".Mathematics of Computation.5(33): 29–34. 1951.doi:10.1090/S0025-5718-51-99443-4.ISSN0025-5718.
External links
edit- Tekn. lic. Olle Karlqvist in memoriam(in Swedish),Google translation,memorial site of one of the engineers behind BARK and BESK. On BARK page there's a technical pdf document (in English):The BARK, A Swedish General Purpose Relay Computer
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