Montego Bay Community College

Westmoreland Campus

Partial Payment, of

the

Associate of Science Degree Program

in

Hospitality and Tourism Management

By

The Council of Community Colleges

Of Jamaica (CCCJ)

Course Name:

Fundamentals of Information Technology

By:

Britany Poyser

Lecturer:

Mr. McNeil

Date:

September 26 2017
 First Generation of Computers (1945–1959)

The first operational electronic general-purpose computer, named the ENIAC (Electronic

Numerical Integrator and Computer), was built in 1943 and used 18,000 vacuum tubes. It was

almost 30.5 meters (100 feet) long and had twenty 10-digit registers for temporary calculations.

It used punched cards for input and output and was programmed with plug board wiring. The

ENIAC was able to compute at the rate of 1,900 additions per second. It was used primarily for

war-related computations such as the construction of ballistic firing tables and calculations to aid

in the building of the atomic bomb. These early machines were typically controlled by plug

board wiring or by a series of directions encoded on paper tape. Certain computations would

require one wiring while other computations would require another. So, while these machines

were clearly programmable, their programs were not stored internally. This would change with

the development of the stored program computer. Another important stored program machine of

this generation was the UNIVAC (Universal Automatic Computer). It was the first successful

commercially available machine. The UNIVAC was designed by Eckert and Mauchly. It used

more than 5,000 vacuum tubes and employed magnetic tape for bulk storage. The machine was

used for tasks such as accounting, actuarial table computation, and election prediction.
 Second Generation of Computers (1960–1964)

The second generation of computer technology was introduced—based not on vacuum tubes but

on transistors. John Bardeen (1908–1991), William B. Shockley (1910–1989), and Walter H.

Brattain (1902–1987) invented the transistor at Bell Telephone Laboratories in the mid-1940s.

By 1948 it was obvious to many that the transistor would probably replace the vacuum tube in

devices such as radios, television sets, and computers. These second generation machines were

programmed in languages such as COBOL (Common Business Oriented Language) and

FORTRAN (Formula Translator) and were used for a wide variety of business and scientific

tasks. Magnetic disks and tape were often used for data storage.

Advantages of Second Generation Computers:

1. Smaller in size compared to the first generation of computer.

2. The second generations’ computers were more reliable.

3. Used less energy and were not heated as much as the first one.

4. Better speed and could calculate data in microseconds.

5. Used faster peripherals.

6. Better portability as compared to the first generation.

 Third Generation of computers (1965-1970)

Computers with Integrated Circuits

Kilby's Original IC

In the third generation of computing, transistors were replaced with the smaller integrated circuit.

It was actually invented by two individuals, both unaware of each other’s actions. Jack Kilby and

Robert Noyce were both worked on almost identical projects made of semiconductor material;

silicon. The first IC was commercially available in 1961. The chips were first used in calculators

for the Air Force computers in 1962. In following years, most computers started using the chips

instead of transistors and other components. The first ics composed of a transistor,

three resistors, and a capacitor. Modern IC can hold up to 125 million transistors. They are

classified as Solid State Technology.

Characteristics of the third generation include:

 Use of Integrated Circuits

 More Reliability

 Much Smaller than those of Prior Generations

 Still Fairly Costly

 Less Heat Generated

 Less Maintenance

 Support Higher Level Language

 Consumed Less Energy

 Keyboard and Monitor (Instead of Punch Cards)

 Fourth Generation of Computers (1971-present)

The fourth generation of computers are called microprocessors. The period of fourth generation

was from 1971 to present. The fourth generation computers was developed using

microprocessor. The microprocessor is a silicon chip contains millions of transistors that was

designed using LSI and VLSI technology. They were the introduction to modern day computers

by basically being a computer's entire Central Processing Unit (CPU) on one integrated circuit.

They're actually just extremely complex and intricate integrated circuits.

Advantages:

1. More reliable than previous generation computers.

2. Perform calculations in Picoseconds.

3. Consumes less power than the previous generation computers.

4. No air conditioning is required.

5. Totally general purpose.

6. Cost is low compared to the previous generation computers.

 Fifth Generation of Computers

Fifth generation computers are in developmental stage which is based on the artificial

intelligence. The goal of the fifth generation is to develop the device which could respond to

natural language input and are capable of learning and self-organization. Quantum computation

and molecular and nanotechnology (a field of science which allows a small computer chip to

control humans atoms and molecules) will be used in this technology. So we can say that the

fifth generation computers will have the power of human intelligence.

CHARACTERISTICS

1) The fifth generation computers will use super large scale integrated chips.

2) They will have artificial intelligence.

3) They will be able to recognize image and graphs.

4) Fifth generation computer aims to be able to solve highly complex problem including decision

making, logical reasoning.

5) They will be able to use more than one CPU for faster processing speed.

6) Fifth generation computers are intended to work with natural language.

 References

http://demarscomputerhistory.weebly.com/3rd-generation.html

http://vle.du.ac.in/mod/book/view.php?id=12290&chapterid=25234

http://www.physics-and-radio-electronics.com/computer-basics/generations-of-computer/fifth-

generation.html

http://generalnote.com/Basic-computer/Second-Generation-of-computer.php

http://latesttechnomanias.blogspot.com/2010/06/fifth-generation-computers.html