23 Jan
2017
23 Jan
'17
12:35 p.m.
On Mon, Jan 23, 2017 at 12:33 PM, Mouse <mouse at rodents-montreal.org> wrote:
fastest$
Consider Babbage's Analytical Engine. It was decimal and it was, not
so much by intrinsic merit as by lack of competition, the fastest
machine of its day.
Admittedly, it ended up being little but vapourware until modern times.
But applying "supercomputer" to vapourware machines is a longstanding
tradition (though perhaps not one dating back quite to Babbage's day).
"The Holy Roman Empire, which was neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an
Empire"
-- Charles
The 7074 was referred to as a
"supercomputer". Can any decimal
machine really bear that title?
I suppose it could. I would apply the term to a
computer that's the