Nimrod (computing)

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A special purpose computer that played the game of Nim, designed and built by Ferranti and displayed at the Exhibition of Science during the 1951 Festival of Britain. Later, when the Festival ended, the computer was shown in Berlin. It was the first digital computer exclusively designed to play a game, though its true intention was to illustrate the principles of the (then novel) digital computer for the public.

[edit] Structure

Nimrod

1	Instructions panel: instructions that Nimrod follows during the game
2	Main panel: bulbs mirror the control panel (5) to show the process of the game to the observers; underneath the bulbs there is a legend describing the possible states of the game.
3	Panel shows the current calculations of the processor during slow game speed; a legend for this is located on panel (1)
4	Four niches with bulbs. Each niche contains 120 bulbs, divided into six blocks of twenty bulbs.
5	Nimrod's control panel: demonstrator would typically sit on the side closer to the computer, while the player woudl sit on the other side of the desk.