Concepts

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Concepts

Artificial Intelligence

Term coined by John McCarthy at the Dartmouth Conference, 1956. See also: Semantic Computation

See also: McCarthy, John, Dartmouth Conference (1956), Minsky, Marvin, Semantic Computation, Large Language Model (LLM), ELIZA, Weizenbaum, Joseph

California Garage, The

Founding myth of Silicon Valley; HP founded in a Palo Alto garage (1939); Apple in a Los Altos garage (1976); concept of the lone inventor and bootstrapped startup

See also: Hewlett-Packard, Hewlett, Bill, Packard, Dave, Jobs, Steve, Wozniak, Steve

CISC (Complex Instruction Set Computing)

Processor design philosophy; contrast with RISC

See also: RISC, Intel, Motorola

CPU (Central Processing Unit)

Concept and component; the primary processor of a computer

See also: RISC, CISC, Intel, MOS Technology, Motorola

Desktop Publishing

Concept and practice coined by Paul Brainerd of Aldus, 1984

See also: Brainerd, Paul, Aldus Corporation, PageMaker, QuarkXPress, Adobe InDesign

Large Language Model (LLM)

Class of AI system. See also: Semantic Computation

See also: Artificial Intelligence, Semantic Computation, ELIZA, Weizenbaum, Joseph, Lanier, Jaron

Lisp machines (concept)

Specialised computers designed to run Lisp efficiently

See also: Lisp, Lisp Machines Inc., Symbolics, McCarthy, John

Memex

Theoretical device described by Vannevar Bush in 'As We May Think' (1945); conceptual precursor to hypertext and the web

See also: Bush, Vannevar, "As We May Think", Nelson, Ted, Engelbart, Douglas, Xanadu

Moore's Law

Observation by Gordon Moore (1965) that transistor density doubles approximately every two years; became a self-fulfilling prophecy driving the semiconductor industry

See also: Moore, Gordon, Intel, Fairchild Semiconductor

Multitasking

Computing concept: ability to run multiple processes concurrently. Preemptive multitasking (OS controls scheduling; e.g. Amiga, Unix) vs cooperative multitasking (programs yield voluntarily; e.g. early Mac, Windows 3.x)

See also: Amiga, UNIX, BSD

RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computing)

Processor design philosophy; contrast with CISC; basis of ARM

See also: CISC, ARM Holdings, MIPS Inc., Furber, Steve, Wilson, Sophie

Semantic Computation

Neologism (J. Walsh); proposed alternative to 'artificial intelligence'; describes what these systems demonstrably do — process and manipulate meaning and symbol relationships — rather than making claims about what they are

See also: Artificial Intelligence, Large Language Model (LLM), Weizenbaum, Joseph

Spreadsheet

Concept and software category. See VisiCalc

See also: VisiCalc, Bricklin, Dan, Frankston, Bob

TCP/IP

Networking protocol suite (Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn, 1974; foundation of the internet)

See also: Cerf, Vint, Kahn, Bob, ARPANET, Berners-Lee, Tim

Xanadu

Ted Nelson's unrealised hypertext project; the road not taken from the web

See also: Nelson, Ted, Memex, Berners-Lee, Tim, Bush, Vannevar