Percy Ludgate
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Percy Ludgate (August 2, 1883- October 16, 1922) was an accountant in Dublin and designer of an Analytical Engine.
Working alone, Ludgate designed an Analytical Engine while unaware of Charles Babbage's designs, although he later went on to write about Babbage's machine. Ludgate's engine used multiplication as its base mechanism unlike Babbage's which used addition, Ludgate's engine used rods similar to slide rules. It's precise mechanism is unknown as only written accounts of the engine survive which do not detail its workings.
His design featured several novelties, including a method of implementing multiplication referred to at the time as 'Irish Logarithms'. (Boys, 1904)
He died of pneumonia in 1922.
[edit] References
- Boys, C.V. "A New Analytical Engine", Nature, 81, 1909 14-15
- From Analytical Engine to Electronic Digital Computer: The Contributions of Ludgate, Torres, and Bush. Brian Randell, October 1982, Annals in the History of Computing, Vol. 4, No. 4
- Ludgate's Analytical Machine of 1909 Brian Randell, The Computer Journal, Volume 14, Issue 3, pp. 317-326. (A subscription to the journal or payment on a per-article basis is required to view this article)
- The Feasibility of Ludgate's Analytical Machine
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