1. A brief history of computing machines

The history of information processing machines has its roots far back in history, and continues today at a very rapid pace. We'll see that this discipline has always developed by absorbing other trends and extending them by opening up new possibilities. It has also been divided into a number of paths, each with its own highly variable future, ranging from success to abandonment.

To explain the origins of this story, we will divide it into four main periods:

• the premises of automatic calculation ;

• automatic calculators ;

• from numerical calculation to the computer ;

• towards ubiquity.