Historical Background of ICT

There are 4 main ages that divide up the history of information technology.

Premechanical

Mechanical

Electromechanical

Electronic

pre-mechanical age

The pre-mechanical age is the earliest age of information technology.

 It can be defined as the time between 3000B.C. and 1450A.D.

We are talking about a long time ago. When humans first started communicating they would try to use language or simple picture drawings known as petroglyphs which were usually carved in the rock. Early alphabets were developed such as the Phoenician alphabet.

Writing started off as just marks in wet clay, but later the paper was created out of papyrus plant and started to communicate with writing.

A calculator was the very first sign of an information processor. The popular model of that time was the abacus.

The electromechanical age

The electromechanical age can be defined as the time between 1840 and 1940.

These are the beginnings of telecommunication. The telegraph was created in the early 1800s. The telephone (one of the most popular forms of communication ever) was created by Alexander Graham Bell in 1876. The first radio developed by Guglielmo Marconi in 1894.

 All of these were extremely crucial emerging technologies that led to big advances in the information technology field.

The first large-scale automatic digital computer in the United States was the Mark 1 created by Harvard University around 1940.

The electronic age

The electronic age in which we currently live in. It can be defined as the time between 1940 and right now.

 The term "information technology" evolved in the 1970s. Its basic concept, however, can be traced to the World War II alliance of the military and industry in the development of electronics, computers, and information theory. 

After the 1940s, the military remained the major source of research and development funding for the expansion of automation to replace manpower with machine power.

The ENIAC was the first high-speed, digital computer capable of being reprogrammed to solve a full range of computing problems. This computer was designed to be used by the U.S. Army for artillery firing tables. This machine was even bigger than the Mark 1.

Then after the different generations of computers were created. Each generation reflected a change to the hardware of decreased size but increased capabilities to control computer operations.

Every day, people use computers in new ways. Computers are increasingly affordable; they continue to be more powerful as information-processing tools as well as easier to use.