Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
than his ability to imagine machines, that brought him to Bletchley
Park, the British Government's top secret centre for analysing
encoded signals intercepted from the enemy. There his interest in
both the abstract world of mathematics and the practical one of
mechanical and electrical engineering served him well. Through
the commitment and intelligence of Turing and others the German
codes used in radio transmissions were broken (illus.
).
35
The
extraordinary demands of complex cryptoanalysis led to radical
and innovative solutions involving mechanized calculating devices,
capable of running through possible solutions with unprecedented
speed (illus.
13
). A number of such devices were built during the
War, and by the end engineers had started to explore the possibili-
ties of electronics. The problem with these machines was not in the
electronics, but in the mechanical components, the relays and those
used to ingest the paper tape that contained the data, so that it
might be read. The solution was to store data internally, in electronic
form. Such work led eventually to the machine that might be
considered to be the first proper digital computer, the Manchester
Mk
14
). It was built and designed by researchers working at
the Royal Society Computer Laboratory, then housed at Manchester
University. It exploited a method of storing data using cathode ray
tubes, designed by F. C. Williams and T. Kilburn at Manchester
1
(illus.
15
13 The 'Bombe' code-
breaking machine at
Bletchley Park, 1943.
