16 Jul
2007
16 Jul
'07
5:17 p.m.
I just caught a part of a TV program showing pictures of and the use of
a computer called LEO.
It was made by and belonged to a UK company called Lyons.
They imported and sold tea, ran a chain of tea shops and restaurants,
made and sold ice cream.
I should know, my father worked for them and we had our own ice cream
freezer just like shops.
Boy were we popular in the summer.!!
Any way LEO (Lyons Electronic Office) took four years to build and was
up and running in 1950.
They showed a large room with closed racks, a console with meters and a
scope of some sort.
Also a punch and printer machine room.
Two applications were featured. A tea blending system and a stock
control system for the tea shops.
The tea shop application was telephone to punched card in real time.
Each teashop had a phone in time slot.
From there it printed picking lists, allocated the
stock and even did a
van route setup with LIFO loading.
It must have been all valve and would need cooling. However Lyons was an
ice cream company and refrigeration would not have been a mystery to
them.
To quote an American actor "I have got to get me one of those!!"
Anybody know of another real commercial electronic computer before 1950?
Rod Smallwood
16 Jul
16 Jul
5:45 p.m.
Rod Smallwood wrote:
I just caught a part of a TV program showing pictures
of and the use of
a computer called LEO.
That wasn't the James May thing that aired last Tuesday was it? I think it was
something along the lines of 'the history of science', and I wondered what
they'd show for origins of the computer - sadly I wasn't around when the show
was on though to see.
Anybody know of another real commercial electronic
computer before 1950?
Hmm, the Ferranti Mark 1 (based on the Manchester Baby) was a commercial
machine and built around that same sort of time. I'm not sure if the Ferranti
machine was the first to be sold to someone (rather than being used in-house)
or whether the LEO was.
(Actually, I'm not sure if LEO I was ever used outside of Lyons - I think it
may have been the later LEO II that was their first true commercial machine)
cheers
Jules
6:53 p.m.
All,
[...]
(Actually, I'm not sure if LEO I was ever used
outside of Lyons - I think it
may have been the later LEO II that was their first true commercial machine)
The first LEO installed outside Lyons was LEO II/3 at the Stewarts and
Lloyds steelworks in Corby. It ran successfully from May 1958 to 1971!
If people are interested, the book, "A Computer Called LEO" by
Georgina Ferry, ISBN 1-84115-186-6 is a good read. I have it sat next
to my computer at the moment and it made a useful reference for the
above!
Simon
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Well, an engineer is not concerned with the truth; that is left to
philosophers and theologians: the prime concern of an engineer is
the utility of the final product."
Lectures on the Electrical Properties of Materials, L.Solymar, D.Walsh
5:50 p.m.
On 16 Jul 2007 at 22:17, Rod Smallwood wrote:
Anybody know of another real commercial electronic
computer before 1950?
IEEE Annals had a really good article on the LEO series. I think the
first outside sale of a cmputer still goes to Eckert-Mauchly for
Univac I in 1951. There were other in-house systems operating then,
but I believe no outside-sales production systems.
Cheers,
Chuck
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