Integrated circuits replace transistors

The next great advance in computing power came with the advent of the integrated circuit. The
idea of the integrated circuit was first conceived by a radar scientist working for the Royal Radar
Establishment of the Ministry of Defence, eoffrey !.". Dummer. Dummer presented the first
public description of an integrated circuit at the #ymposium on $rogress in %uality Electronic
&omponents in !ashington, D.&. on ' May ()*+.
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The first practical /&s were invented by 0ack 1ilby at Texas /nstruments and Robert 2oyce at
3airchild #emiconductor.
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1ilby recorded his initial ideas concerning the integrated circuit in
0uly ()*5, successfully demonstrating the first working integrated example on (+ #eptember
()*5.
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/n his patent application of 4 3ebruary ()*), 1ilby described his new device as 6a body
of semiconductor material ... wherein all the components of the electronic circuit are completely
integrated.7
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2oyce also came up with his own idea of an integrated circuit half a year later
than 1ilby.
,89.
:is chip solved many practical problems that 1ilby;s had not. $roduced at
3airchild #emiconductor, it was made of silicon, whereas 1ilby;s chip was made of germanium.
This new development heralded an explosion in the commercial and personal use of computers
and led to the invention of the microprocessor. !hile the sub<ect of exactly which device was the
first microprocessor is contentious, partly due to lack of agreement on the exact definition of the
term =microprocessor=, it is largely undisputed that the first single>chip microprocessor was the
/ntel 8998,
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designed and realised by Ted :off, 3ederico 3aggin, and #tanley Ma?or at /ntel.
,8+.
Mobility and the growth of smartphone computers
!ith the continued miniaturisation of computing resources, and advancements in portable
battery life, portable computers grew in popularity in the ())9s.
,citation needed.
The same
developments that spurred the growth of laptop computers and other portable computers allowed
manufacturers to integrate computing resources into cellular phones. These so>called
smartphones run on a variety of operating systems and are rapidly becoming the dominant
computing device on the market, with manufacturers reporting having shipped an estimated +-'
million devices in +% +9(-.
,8-.
Programs
The defining feature of modern computers which distinguishes them from all other machines is
that they can be programmed. That is to say that some type of instructions @the programA can be
given to the computer, and it will process them. Modern computers based on the von 2eumann
architecture often have machine code in the form of an imperative programming language.
/n practical terms, a computer program may be <ust a few instructions or extend to many millions
of instructions, as do the programs for word processors and web browsers for example. " typical
modern computer can execute billions of instructions per second @gigaflopsA and rarely makes a
mistake over many years of operation. Barge computer programs consisting of several million
instructions may take teams of programmers years to write, and due to the complexity of the task
almost certainly contain errors.