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Essay on computer history of computer software and hardware
Essay on computer history of computer software and hardware
History of computer development
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History of Microsoft Windows
Nicholas Charter
Section 48693
There are over one billion computers in the world running the Windows operating system. The company responsible for this enormous feat has been ever growing since its creation on April 4, 1975 by the brilliant minds of Paul Alan and Bill Gates. This company is of course, the one and only, Microsoft.
It all started with the Atari 8000, and Bill and Alan’s quest to acquire a contract with the manufactures, MITS, to incorporate the programming language, BASIC. Through the rest of the last seventies and early eighties, Microsoft’s products were mainly based around BASIC, but for the other competitors in the computing world, such as the Commodore 64 and the Apple II.
UNIX, an operating system developed in 1969 by AT&T, has licensed out variants of its original works over the years, the most commonly known is the still licensed, Mac OSX, and the various forms of the open source OS, Linux. But this too is where Microsoft began its venture into the OS market in 1980 when a variant was obtained and dubbed, Xenix. Xenix became the first the rum the immensely successful word processing program, Multi-Tool Word, now Microsoft Word. In 1980 Microsoft was approached by the big time company, IBM, with the task of developing a new OS. In response, MS-DOS, short for Microsoft – Disk Operating System, was developed. This severely changed the way computing was done, with the introduction of the “C:” Language, descendants of which are still used today. But while this was extremely effective for professionals, this was not the kind of system the everyday person could use due mostly to its solely text based interface, and thusly the need for a graphically based interface began. The first v...
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...over a decade, while still keeping it available through a button on the taskbar, the main interface is comprised of blocks that make the programs more like the apps you would find on mobile devices rather than on a typical computer.
Works Cited
• Bailey, David. "Opening up Microsoft." UNIX Review June 1997: 23+. Computer Database. Web. 22 Feb. 2013.
• Bellis, Mary. "The Unusual History of Microsoft Windows." About.com Inventors. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Feb. 2013.
• Honan, Mat. "Microsoft." Wired May 2013: 110. Computer Database. Web. 22 Feb. 2013.
• Leonhard, Woody. "Microsoft's 13 worst missteps of all time; DOS 4.0, Zune, and Windows 8 are but a few of the landmarks among 25 years of failures Redmond-style." InfoWorld.com 14 Jan. 2013. Computer Database. Web. 04 Mar. 2013.
• Todea, Lucian. "Soft32.com News." Soft32com News. N.p., 16 June 2006. Web. 04 March. 2013.
By 1993 Microsoft's windows computer programming function became the most widely used operating system in the world. When Microsoft was still an idea, Bill Gates led Apple to believe he would help them succeed in creating the best computer programming systems in the nation, however, Gates left it unknown to Apple he planned to release his own software. Gates took notes and allowed Apple to release the software he helped them to create. Then shortly after, Microsoft introduced windows. Apple claimed Gates had stolen their ideas, as windows looked surprisingly similar to Apple's version. Gates claimed he used his own ideas because it was his own that made Apple's renowned software. As Microsoft was leading in the world, Apple threatened Microsofts position in the world of technological advances by introducing a new software program that could potentially take Microsoft's top spot in the market away from them. Gates quickly said that he had created a new software that was set to release also, although he had no idea of new software at the time and made the excuse to possibly buy himself a bit of time. About eight months later, Microsoft released the new software program, as bill gates had proclaimed, retaining the top spot in the market. Microsoft's expansion today has reached every technological realm possible. Occluded in the newest developments are
Microsoft is an American company that was founded by William Henry Gates III, as known as Bill Gates, and his his high school friend Paul Gardner Allen in 1975 April 4. But unluckily, Paul Allen resigned from Microsoft in 1983 after developing Hodgkin’s disease. In 1985 October 20, Microsoft released Microsoft window. It is the first original operating system. It is a graphical extension for MS-DOS. Even though, it’s not handy like nowadays Microsoft window. Then in 1990, Microsoft introduced Microsoft office, which is a bundle office productivity application with Microsoft Word and Microsoft excel. The Microsoft Word was the first application that could display italics. And the Microsoft Office would be available for free for all the PC World’s computer that is produce on that same year in November. In the 2000 February 17, Microsoft released Window 2000 operating system, and according to Microsoft it is the most safe operating system in the world at that time. But still, there are so many problems and glitches need to be fixed. Besides there are mutable computer viruses are made specially to attack Window 2000. Rush to gain back the sales. In the 2001 October 25 Window xp is available. The new operating system fix most of the problem. Although some of the user were still complaining the system that it will take your information, but in the 2007 January, there are 76% of people in the entire world are using the operating system.
The now highly profitable and cash rich Microsoft diversified into a wide variety of software products including: compilers and interpreters for programming languages and word processors, spreadsheets and other office software some of these products were successful, and some were not. By the turn of the millennium, many of Microsoft's software products dominated the market in their respective categories.
After reading the January 1, 1975 issue of Popular Electronics that demonstrated the Altair 8800, Bill Gates called the creators of the new microcomputer, MITS (Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems), offering to demonstrate an implementation of the BASIC programming language for the system.[22] Gates had neither an interpreter nor an Altair system, yet in the eight weeks before the demo he and Allen developed the interpreter. The interpreter worked at the demo and MITS agreed to distribute Altair BASIC.[7] Gates left Harvard University, moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico where MITS was located, and founded Microsoft there. The name Microsoft, without the hyphen, was first used in a letter from Gates to Allen on November 29, 1975,[7] and on November 26, 1976 the name became a registered trademark.[22] The company's first international office was founded on November 1, 1978, in Japan, entitled "ASCII Microsoft" (now called "Microsoft Japan").[22] On January 1, 1979, the company moved from Albuquerque to a new home in Bellevue, Washington. [22] Steve Ballmer joined the company on June 11, 1980, and would later succeed Bill Gates as CEO.[22] The company restructured on June 25, 1981, to become an incorporated business in its home state of Washington (with a further change of its name to "Microsoft, Inc."). As part of the restructuring, Bill Gates became president of the company and Chairman of the Board, and Paul Allen became Executive Vice President.[22]
In 500 B.C. the abacus was first used by the Babylonians as an aid to simple arithmetic. In 1623 Wihelm Schickard (1592 - 1635) invented a "Calculating Clock". This mechanical machine could add and subtract up to 6 digit numbers, and warned of an overflow by ringing a bell. J. H. Mueller comes up with the idea of the "difference engine", in 1786. This calculator could tabulate values of a polynomial. Muellers attempt to raise funds fails and the project was forgotten. Scheutz and his son Edward produced a 3rd order difference engine with a printer in 1843 and their government agreed to fund their next project.
This was the same year when Bill Gates and Paul Allen co-founded Microsoft. In 1981, Bill Gates’ company was hired to develop an operating system but rather than creating a new operating system they decided to buy a preexisting operation system called QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating System) for the amount of 50,000 dollars. After modifying the operating system they bought, they renamed the operating system to MS-DOS. After MS-DOS began selling it brought in a steady income for Gates due to the fact that the PC market was growing and there weren’t many competitors in the market for them to compete with. In 1986, when Microsoft Corporation went public, it made Gates into a millionaire overnight. The following year, Microsoft released their first ever version of
Microsoft, one of the largest corporations in the world today, employs over 93,000 people and is a public, multinational company that manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of software products for computers and is most widely known for its Microsoft Windows operating system. Microsoft not only markets computer hardware products such as the Microsoft mouse and the Microsoft Natural keyboard, but it also manufactures and sells home entertainment products including, the Xbox, Xbox 360, and Zune. It also holds assets in other markets including the MSNBC cable television network, the MSN Internet portal, and the Microsoft Encarta multimedia encyclopedia.
In this paper, team B will discuss the internal and external factors of the Microsoft Corporation. We will explain how these factors affect the four functions of management, planning, organizing, leading, and controlling. Also, we will explain how globalization, technology, innovation, diversity and ethics will be delegated to manage the different factors. Microsoft Corporation was established in 1975 in Albuquerque, New Mexico producing software for developing, manufacturing, licensing, and support for range of software products and service for different type of computing devices. Microsoft grew from six employees to the largest personal computer software company in the world. By 1978, Microsoft earned $500,000 in the first quarter, and by the end of the year they earned revenue of $1,000,000. In the early 1980s Microsoft, in collaboration with IBM they released MS-DOS as their first 16-bit operating system. However after the late 1980s, Microsoft started to build its reputation by creating the Microsoft windows operating system and Microsoft office product, which includes internet explorer, excel, PowerPoint, and word programs. Then in the late 1990s, Microsoft teamed with Sega to incorporated their windows software package into the game developer’s Dreamcast hardware. Also they developed their own gaming system called the Xbox and that eventually was replaced by the xbox360. Microsoft has come a long way and is no longer just a worldwide leader in computer programming but also a major part of the technology world. Microsoft windows have been the flagship and accounts for most of its revenue for Microsoft: but the company has also branched ...
Microsoft’s mission of placing a “PC running Microsoft software on every desk and in every home” drove their overall strategy early on. Depending on the business segment within Microsoft, one would see in place very different business models as the strategy for each line of business could vary. In the operating system (OS) segment, Microsoft initially brought in an existing product and modified this (MS-DOS) to work with the Intel microprocessor, which were the “brains” of the IBM PC. Microsoft partnered with IBM to provide the operating system for the IBM PC. In addition to developing Windows, Microsoft during this period was working to write applications for the Apple OS.
It all began in 1991, during the time of monumental computing development. DOS had been bought from a Seattle hacker by Bill Gates, for a sum of $50,000 – a small price for an operating system that had managed sneak its way across the globe due to a clever marketing strategy. Apple’s OS and UNIX were both available, though the cost of running either was far greater than that of running DOS. Enter MINIX, an operating system developed from the ground up by Andrew S. Tanenbaum, a college professor. MINIX was part of a lesson plan used to teach students the inner-workings of an operating system. Tanenbaum had written a book on MINIX called “Operating System” and anyone who had picked up a copy would find the 12,000 lines of code that comprised MINIX itself. This was a big issue; due to the fact that all know (well published) operating systems to that point had been well guarded by software developers, thus making it difficult for people to truly expand on operating system mechanics.
Microsoft has always been known as a software company, and not well known for its hardware. In fact, the only hardware that Microsoft sells to the retail market is branded peripherals. In its heyday, Microsoft was a market leader, bring an operating system to the masses, and leading in internet search. In recent years, however, most of the moves that Microsoft has made have not been in a market leader position, but have been in response to competitors threatening Microsoft’s positions.
Bellis, M. (n.d.). Putting Microsoft on the map: History of the MS-DOS Operating Systems, IBM & Microsoft. In About.com Inventors. Retrieved January 14, 2012, from http://inventors.about.com/od/computersoftware/a/Putting-Microsoft-On-The-Map.htm
Today Microsoft is one of the largest software maker companies and one of the most powerful and valuable corporations.
Thousands of years ago calculations were done using people’s fingers and pebbles that were found just lying around. Technology has transformed so much that today the most complicated computations are done within seconds. Human dependency on computers is increasing everyday. Just think how hard it would be to live a week without a computer. We owe the advancements of computers and other such electronic devices to the intelligence of men of the past.
Microsoft is the leading and the largest Software Company in the world. Found by William Gates and Paul Allen in 1975 Microsoft has grown and become a multibillion company in only ten years. It all started with a great vision – “a computer on every desk and every home” - that seemed almost impossible at the time. Now Microsoft has over 44,000 employees in 60 countries, net income of $3.45 billion and revenue of 11.36 billion. Company dramatic growth and success was driven by development and marketing of operational systems and personal productivity applications software.