For those on my side of the Big Pond, a "valve" is what those on stapp's side of the Big Pond call a vacuum tube. Having worked with pre-solid state computers (in a NORAD "block house" in the early 1970's), these valves/tubes are large "diode" valves, about 6 inches in length. A diode allows current to flow freely, but only in one direction - positive to negative, for example. If the current attempts to flow negative to positive, the diode acts as an "open" and blocks the flow. When this is controlled (by a program), each diode represents one "bit" (a single "1" or a single "0") of data. So we are talking just over a whopping 2KB of data! Note vacuum tubes are not very reliable so surely several 100 were "on-line" (probably not a real term back then) spares. Pretty cool. Actually, it was HOT! This is because vacuum tubes/valves use a heating element - a filament just like a little space heater or incandescent light bulb. So with 2,500 valves all lit up at once, that room would have been quite warm, if not hot! In the "block house" they had big air conditioners and HUGE circulation fans to keep everything relatively cool. So I would have liked to see how they controlled the heat back in 1944. Air conditioning, using compressed refrigerant gases, were around in the 1940s, even available in some cars like the Packard. But it was much less sophisticated. I bring this up simply to say it is too bad they don't have a picture of the valve room. It would have been very interesting to see that - and how they cooled it, too. I find it really interesting they kept its existence secret for so long. I wonder why? After the war, wasn't really that much of a secret any longer - especially since, by the 2000s, computer technologies had long past made all that very obsolete. And the world knew shortly after the war the Nazi code had been cracked. Oh well. I am "guessing" it remained secret simply because nobody asked about it before then. And so it finally came out due to an inquiry through the Freedom of Information Act. Interesting. Thanks for posting.
It was an interesting post. I'm sure they were kept busy keeping with the maintenance it must have required.
What I miss in the article (or maybe I'm wrong?) is mentioning Alan Turing and the Turing machine and the Enigma machine ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Turing
https://www.tnmoc.org Also see here about Colossus https://www.tnmoc.org/colossus And this has a 3D walkthrough all under the EXPLORE tab at the top of the site page. @Bill_Bright Info on that site says that information about Colossus was only declassified in 1975
Interesting. I will note that "declassified" is not the same as unclassified or released, or even made available to the public. Being classified, in this sense, just dictates how the information will be stored, handled and who has access to it. When classified, the information is stored in a safe where one needs the necessary security clearance "AND" a "need to know" to see it. When declassified, it comes out of the safe and put on a shelf where the public then "can" see it "IF" they know it is exists, and where to find it. It would seem it came out of the safe in 1975 - but with no fanfare or public announcement. And it was not until years later in 1992 when others took an interest in uncovering the full story and got a working version going again.
Interesting article to be sure. I came up in the Floor AM/Shortwave Radio & Black n White Screen TV Tube era myself. Those code breaker setup rooms back then must have really been BUZZING.
same here, it was an invention with or by Alan Turing. I saw the film with Cumberbatch. its pretty poor of BBC to deny his participation on this machine. Turing got the royal pardon in 2013, 10 years before. what a shame as he was one to prevent a very mistake in history.
If you look at the quote in stapp's #6 post above, he's in there. It looks like Colossus was a second system, perhaps on a parallel (though perhaps in concert and not competing) development path.
Alan Turing did not design the Colossus computer. He developed the earlier Bombe mechanical machine. Colosses was designed and built by Tommy Flowers. I believe some of Tommy Flowers work is still secret even today. See the links below. https://historicengland.org.uk/list...ighlights/worlds-first-programmable-computer/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossus_computer https://bletchleypark.org.uk/our-story/6-facts-about-the-bombe/
