Google today shows respect to the Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace, an English mathematician and writer by a Google Doodle dedicated to her. She is also known as the founder of scientific computing.
The Countess is known for her work on Charles Babbage’s early mechanical general-purpose computer, also known as the Analytical Engine. She was born on this day in 1815 and lived for 37 years. Her notes on the Analytical Engine include what is recognized as the first algorithm intended to be processed by a machine. Because of this, she is often considered the world’s first computer programmer.
In 1842 Charles Babbage was invited to give a seminar at the University of Turin about his analytical engine. Luigi Menabrea, a young Italian engineer, and future Prime Minister of Italy, wrote up Babbage’s lecture in French. Babbage asked Ada to translate Menabrea’s paper into English, subsequently requesting that she augment the notes she had added to the translation. After a year these notes, which were more extensive than Menabrea’s paper, were published. After about a hundred years after her death in 1953 the notes were republished. The engine was recognized as an early model for a computer and Ada’s notes as a description of a computer and software.
Ada Lovelace died on 27 November 1852.
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