Databases Reference
In-Depth Information
1.1 T
HE
De
VELOPMENT OF
D
ATA
YOUR
TURN
T
he need to organize and store data
has arisen many times and in many ways throughout
history. In addition to the data-focused events presented in
this chapter, what other historical events can you think of
that have made people think about organizing and storing
data? As a hint, you might think about the exploration
and conquest of new lands, wars, changes in type of
governments such as the introduction of democracy, and
the implications of new inventions such as trains, printing
presses, and electricity.
Q
UESTION
:
Develop a timeline showing several historical events that
influenced the need to organize and store data. Include
a few noted in this chapter as well as a few that you
can think of independently.
fact, punched cards were the only data storage medium used in the increasingly
sophisticated electromechanical accounting machines of the 1920s, 1930s, and
1940s.They were still used extensively in the early computers of the 1950s and
1960s and could even be found well into the 1970s in smaller information systems
installations, to a progressively reduced degree.
The middle to late 1930s saw the beginning of the era of erasable magnetic
storage media, with Bell Laboratories experimenting with magnetic tape for sound
storage. By the late 1940s, there was early work on the use of magnetic tape for
recording data. By 1950, several companies, including RCA and Raytheon, were
developing the
magnetic tape
concept for commercial use. Both UNIVAC and
Raytheon offered commercially available magnetic tape units in 1952, followed by
IBM in 1953, Figure 1.7. During the mid-1950s and into the mid-1960s, magnetic
FIGURE 1.7
Early magnetic tape drive,
circa 1953
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