(Germany) and for a long time lived with his parents in the north of Saxony in the town of Hoyerswerda (German. Hoyerswerda). From childhood, the boy showed interest in designing. While still at school, he designed a working model of a coin changer and created a project for a city of 37 million inhabitants. And during his student years, he first came up with the idea of creating an automatic programmable calculator.
Zuse believed that the structure of the universe is similar to a network of interconnected computers. He publishes the book "Rechnender Raum" ("Computing Space"), which was translated into English in the year by employees with the title "Calculating Space".
In - years, despite suffering a heart attack, Zuse recreated his first computer "Z1". The finished model had 30,000 components, cost DM 800,000, and required 4 enthusiasts (including Zuse himself) to assemble it. The project was financed by Siemens AG along with five other companies.
Currently, a fully functioning computer model "Z3" is in the "Deutsches Museum" in the city of Munich, and a model of the calculator "Z1" has been transferred to the German Technical Museum in Berlin. Today, the latter also hosts a special exhibition dedicated to Konrad Zuse and his work. The exhibition features twelve of his machines, original papers on the development of the Plankalkül language, and several paintings by Zuse.
Zuse received the Harry M. Goode Memorial Award for his contributions and early successes in the field of automatic computing, independently proposing the use of binary and floating point arithmetic, and designing Germany's first and one of the world's very first program-controlled computers ( English Harry M. Goode Memorial Award), a medal and $2,000 from computer society.
In the year Zuse became the first honorary member of the German "Computer Society", and since then it has begun to award the “Konrad Zuse Medal”, which today has become the most famous German award in the field of computer science. In th, for his life's work, Zuse was awarded the Order of the Cross of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. And in the -m on the ZDF channel, he was called the "greatest" of the living Germans.
After retiring, Zuse took up his favorite hobby, painting. Zuse died on December 18 in Hünfeld (Germany). Today, several cities in Germany have streets named after him.
Literature
- Konrad Zuse: Der Vater des Computers./ Jürgen Alex, Hermann Flessner, Wilhelm Mons u. a. - Parzeller, . - 264 S (German). ISBN 3-7900-0317-4, KNO-NR: 08 90 94 10
- Die Rechenmaschinen von Konrad Zuse/ Hrsg. v. Raul Rojas. - Berlin: Springer, . - VII, 221 S (German). ISBN 3-540-63461-4, KNO-NR: 07 36 04 31
- Der Computer mein Leben./ Konrad Zuse (German) .
- The Computer - My Life- Springer Verlag (August) (English) . ISBN 0-387-56453-5
- Meet the computer = Understanding computers: Computer basics: Input/Output; Per. from English. K. G. Bataeva; Ed. and with prev. V. M. Kurochkina - Moscow: World, . - 240 p., ill. ISBN 5-03-001147-1(Russian) .
- Computer language = Understanding computers: Software: Computer Languages; Per. from English. S. E. Morkovin and V. M. Khodukina; Ed. and with prev. V. M. Kurochkina - Moscow: World, . - 240 p., ill. ISBN 5-03-001148-X (Russian) .
Links
- Wikimedia Commons has media related to Konrad Zuse
- Biography (English)
- Short biography at LeMO Online Virtual Museum (German)
- Konrad Zuse and his calculators on the site of his son, Hornst Zuse at the Technical University of Berlin (German)
- Konrad Zuse Internet Archive
- Technical University of Berlin (German) (English)
- The Life and Works of Konrad Zuse
- Konrad Zuse (English)
- Konrad Zuse, creator of the first programmable computer
- Zuse's Thesis on Digital Physics and the Computable Universe
- Information about the Konrad Zuse Museum in Hoyerswerda (German) (English)
Konrad Zuse is a German inventor, one of the founders of modern computer technology. He is best known as the creator of the first programmable (and Turing complete) computer in the world.
Konrad was born in Berlin, Germany (Berlin, Germany); later his family moved to Braunsberg, East Prussia (Braunsberg, East Prussia). In 1923, the Zuse family changed their place of residence again, settling in Hoyerswerda; here Zuse was trained in 1928, having received the right to enter the university. For some time, Conrad studied engineering and architecture, but soon these areas bored him; in 1935, Zuse received a diploma in civil engineering. He worked briefly at Ford, where he used his outstanding talents as an artist to design advertisements. Subsequently, Konrad moved to the Henschel aircraft factory, where he was already engaged in engineering design. On duty, he had to do a lot of rather monotonous calculations; this process Zuse was pretty annoying, awakening dreams of automation.
Zuse began experimenting with computers in 1935, in his parents' apartment. His first development, the Z1 model, was completed in 1936; it was essentially a mechanical calculator with limited programming capabilities.
In 1937, Konrad received 2 patents, in many respects anticipating the further work of von Neumann (John von Neumann); by 1938 he had completed the Z1. This device contained about 30,000 metal parts and, due to the inaccuracy of the convergence of parts, did not always work as it should. The first model was destroyed on January 30, 1944; later, between 1987 and 1989, Konrad restored his creation.
In 1939, Zuse was drafted into the army, where he was given enough funds to build the Z2. He presented the finished version in September 1940; it occupied several rooms in the same apartment and was already built on telephone relays.
Government subsidies received enabled Conrad to continue his research; in 1941 he completed the Z3 version. This programmable 22-bit calculator could work with real numbers, supported cyclic operations, had built-in memory and was built on all the same relays (mostly defective ones). Despite the absence of conditional jumps, this machine was Turing-complete (which, however, Zuse himself was not particularly interested in - the inventor was driven more by practical considerations than scientific interest).
In 1942, Zuse began work on the Z4; after one of the air raids, the partially finished car was taken out of Berlin. It was possible to continue work on the computer only in 1949; On July 12, 1950, the work was completed - and the car turned out to be impressively reliable.
Konrad Zuse had never been a member of the Nazi Party, but he never worried too much about having to work for the Nazi war machine. As Zuse stated much later, the best scientists and engineers always had to either make a deal with their conscience, participating in morally dubious projects, or simply forget about working in their specialty.
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This title was awarded to a German engineer who was born in 1910 and died at the age of 85 (his biography is described in more detail in the article “Computer Museum”, PC Week / RE, No. 9/98, p. 60).
In the 1930s, Zuse worked as an aircraft designer for Henschel Aircraft and had to perform enormous amounts of calculations to determine the optimal wing design. At that time, there were only mechanical calculators with a decimal number system, and Zuse became interested in the problem of automating the entire calculation process, since he was forced to perform many monotonous routine calculations according to a given scheme. In 1934, Zuse came up with a model of an automatic calculator, which consisted of a control device, a computing device and memory, and completely coincided with the architecture of today's computers.
During those years, Zuse concluded that future computers would be based on six principles:
- binary number system;
- the use of devices operating on the principle of "yes / no" (logical 1 and 0);
- fully automated operation of the calculator;
- software control of the computing process;
- support for floating point arithmetic;
- use of large capacity memory.
Zuse was absolutely right. He was the first in the world to say that data processing begins with a bit (he called the bit yes / no status, and the formulas of binary algebra - conditional propositions), the first to introduce the term “machine word” (word), the first to combine arithmetic and logical operations in the calculator , noting that “the elementary operation of a computer is to test two binary numbers for equality. The result will also be a binary number with two values (equal, not equal)”. At the same time, Zuse had no idea not only about similar studies of colleagues in the USA and England, but even about Charles Babbage's mechanical calculator, created in the 19th century.
In 1936 Zuse patented the idea of a mechanical memory. A year later, he created a working memory for storing 12 binary numbers of 24 bits and actively engaged in the creation of the first version of his calculator, which he first called Versuchsmodell-1 (V-1), but this abbreviation coincided with the name of the German rockets V1, and then he renamed your creation in Z1. The arithmetic module could work with floating point numbers (in fact, they consisted of two numbers: one was a 16-bit mantissa, the other was a 7-bit exponent), converted binary numbers to decimal numbers and vice versa, and supported data input and output. The program input device using perforated film was made by Helmut Schreyer, a friend of Zuse who had previously worked as a projectionist. The calculation results were shown using electric lamps. The Z1 was completed in 1938 and ran erratically due to unreliable mechanical memory.
The leadership of the Institute for Aerodynamic Research of the Third Reich became interested in the works of Zuse. They undertook to finance work on the next model of the Z2 calculator. As a more reliable elemental base, Konrad chose electromagnetic telephone relays, the only devices at that time suitable for creating a computer. The relay Z2 was built in April 1939 and worked successfully, but Zuse was drafted into the army, and although he had very influential friends, he served a year before returning to the institute. There he began to design a more powerful model - Z3, then he was again called to the front, but after a short time he returned to the institute completely.
Zuse completed the Z3 on December 5, 1941. The input of the program, which was a sequence of rather powerful logical commands, still came from perforated film. The Z3 memory allowed storing 64 words (14 bits per mantissa, 7 bits per exponent and 1 bit per sign) and consisted of 1400 relays. The arithmetic calculator required 600 relays, and another 400 relays were used in the control device. Z3 performed not only 4 arithmetic operations, but also the calculation of the square root, multiplication by -1, 0.1, 0.5, 2 and 10. The speed of the Z3 was approximately equal to the speed of the American computer Harvard Mark I, created in the late 40s. x years. Z3 performed 3-4 additions per second and multiplied two numbers in 4-5 seconds, while allowing floating point numbers to be processed more efficiently than
At the same time, Zuse was designing mechanical devices for remote control of bombs to improve the accuracy of hitting the target. To create a model, very large calculations were required, and he first made a specialized computer that performed a fixed sequence of operations. Then he decided to also automate the work of the data entry operator, and was the first in the world to make what is today called an analog-to-digital converter.
Due to the small amount of memory on the Z3, it was impossible to solve, in particular, systems of linear equations, which the institute needed. In 1941, Zuse decided to develop a more powerful model - Z4. He understood all the disadvantages of his machine and wanted to create a full-fledged computer, which, according to Zuse himself, required a memory capacity of at least 8 thousand words. But the German leadership told him that Germany was so close to victory that she did not need computers. During the war, all practical work in this area completely stopped. At the end of the war, Zuse was arrested for a short time, but denied all his life that he was doing any secret work for the government.
After the war, Zuse was temporarily out of work. Z3 was destroyed, Z4 was not completed, foreign computers did not work yet, and he engaged in theoretical research. He was assisted by the mathematician Herr Lochmeyer. Zuse tried to automate the game of chess, to describe the rules of the game in terms of logical calculations. Immediately there were problems that are well known today to specialists in artificial intelligence - there was no suitable toolkit for working with complex data structures. In 1945, Zuse created the world's first symbolic language Plankalkul (the term "algorithmic language" did not yet exist) and the address translation technique, in addition, he had ideas for using subroutines with parameters. At the same time, Zuse came up with a name for his device - a logical computer.
In the early 1950s, the German economy was on the rise. Zuse organized the Zuze KG company, built the Z11 machine and used it to solve the problems of land redevelopment and the design of optical instruments. Already then there were problems of creation of good software. Zuse then built the Z22, which supported general computational algorithms, could work with arbitrary data structures, had ample memory, and was popular with many German engineers and scientists. Zuse believed that he would have orders for settlements from small and medium-sized companies, but they did not really need such services at that time, and Zuze KG turned out to be unprofitable. State funding for work in the computer field began later.
Zuse continued to experiment with various computing devices, made an automatic drawing board - the first prototype of modern CAD. In 1964, he proposed an automatic control system for large looms. Since 1966, Zuse began to work for Siemens AG.
Zuse considered one of his most outstanding achievements the creation of the Plankalkul language, which was not tied to the architecture and instruction sets of a particular computer, unlike the first assembly languages.
Plankalkul introduced the concept of an object. An object could be primitive, based on binary numbers of arbitrary length (when writing a logical unit, Zuse used the symbol L; for example, the binary number 1001 was written as L00L), and composite (structures, recursively defined arrays of arbitrary dimensions, etc.). A bitmap of dimension [n][m] was denoted as n x m x S0. Indexing in Plankalkul always started from 0. It was allowed to work with subarrays: for a three-dimensional array V, you can specify a matrix V[i] and a vector V[i][j]. The notation S1 was used to describe the variable. n (n bits).
Plankalkul allowed the use of much more complex syntactic constructions. The decimal number (0-9) was defined using the notation S1 . 4 (4 bits, values 0 to 15) with range restriction imposed. The structure of three components was written, for example, as (A2, S1 . 4, A3), where the objects A2 and A3 were defined earlier. To arrange complex descriptions in the language, a special syntax was used.
The combination “letter + number” was used as variable identifiers. The first letter could be V (input parameter), Z (intermediate value), R (result value), C (constant). Programs and subprograms (parameters passed by value) were treated as variables (prefix P). For example, a P3 entry. 7 meant calling the 7th program of the 3rd program group. Plankalkul envisaged the possibility of running arrays of programs, which today is only implemented in distributed systems!
Zuse came up with the assignment operator, for which he defined the sign. At the Zurich conference on Algol, the European group wanted to introduce it into the language standard, and only under strong pressure from the American group, which was not interested in introducing characters that were not supported in US computers, agreed to the combination: =.
Plankalkul supported powerful syntactic constructions and allowed complex conditional loops to be written compactly. True, the recording of the program was “multi-story”, with superscripts and subscripts, and looked like the symbolic flow charts that became widespread in the USA in the 60s. In terms of power, Plankalkul was close to Algol 68, but unlike it, Plankalkul did not support address arithmetic, which generally increased the reliability of the program. Many different non-computational algorithms were written on Plankalkul: processing symbolic information, generating chess moves, etc. In the Retrocomputing museum (www.ccil.org/retro/), the author of the article was informed that a compiler for Plankalkul was planned to be made in memory of Zuse.
Today Zuse's works are known all over the world. He had an undeniable influence on the development of European computer technology. His work was used in the creation of new computers and especially in the development of the first algorithmic programming languages. Konrad Zuse has received many awards and prizes and has earned international recognition. In the last years of his life, he was mainly engaged in drawing. Zuse apparently retained his love for the fine arts from the time when, as a twenty-five-year-old engineer, he drew numerous diagrams of his first computers.
Today, when personal computers are churned out in millions of units every year, it is hard to imagine that some 60-70 years ago computers were assembled by hand by individual enthusiasts, in conditions far from factory ones. The 30s and 40s of the last century were a "pioneer" milestone in the history of computers. It was an amazing time that predetermined not only the development and growth of computer technology in the future. It also marked the beginning of a person's total dependence on computers in almost all spheres of his life, the beginning of computerization, digital methods of computing and storing data, etc.
The most rapid and important advances in the development of science and technology are due to the military-industrial complex, that is, the military-industrial complex. It is here that huge human, financial and other resources are usually concentrated. For this reason, the army needs the most high-tech murder weapons, the development of which requires not only costs, but also scientific and technological innovations and discoveries. It is unlikely that the development of nuclear energy proceeded at such a pace, if the USA and the USSR did not have a real race to create an atomic bomb. In the First World War, artillery, armored forces, and aviation were used, but complex calculations (ballistic, for example) were not yet required, due to the obvious "underdevelopment" of military equipment, science and industry. And in the 30s of the last century, the military of the most developed countries of the world needed machines that could quickly and accurately calculate a wide variety of operations. It became more and more difficult for people to cope with routine work, growing like a snowball, which is why the most gifted representatives of the human race had the idea to shift the boring task to the "mechanical shoulders" of the computer. In a word, the pre-war situation in Europe in the mid-30s of the twentieth century literally pushed technical geniuses into the arms of a general. Could not resist such "fraternization" and Konrad Zuse (Konrad Zuse), an outstanding German designer and thinker. Zuse was born on June 22, 1910 in Berlin, but grew up in northern Saxony. Inventing young Conrad began at an early age. Such a fact is well known - at school they were presented with a project of a working machine for changing coins. So it is not surprising that in 1935 Zuse successfully graduated from the Berlin-Charlottenburg Higher Technical School and left with an engineering degree. Then fate brought him to the Henschel aircraft factory in the city of Dessau. Here the interests of Zuse and the military intersected. At first, it's very odd. The newly minted engineer worked at the factory for about a year, and then put a letter of resignation on the table to his superiors. But Zuse left in order to create ... a programmable calculating machine. Even in his student years (starting around 1934), he began to think about creating a machine for computing. The final impetus to the creation of such a machine was given by the daily routine calculations that Conrad had to deal with at work. In particular, he pored over the calculations of the load that occurs when the wing vibrates. But a computer programmable machine is not a machine for changing coins. Konrad Zuse understood the seriousness of the work he undertook, and therefore he immediately equipped an entire room in his parents' house for his "workshop". Parents did not share filial enthusiasm, however, we must give them their due, they provided Conrad with all possible assistance. Thus, the funds for the construction of the machine were exclusively private. The beginning of work on the first Zuse computer programmable machine dates back to 1936. A characteristic feature of this machine was that not relays were used for switching, but metal plates. Zuse's perseverance can only be envied, because these two tens of thousands (!) Plates were cut with a jigsaw, however, not without the help of his closest friends. Despite all the difficulties, in 1938 Zuse was able to demonstrate a programmable digital machine to his parents and friends. At first, it was called V-1 (Versuchsmodell-1, that is, "Experimental Model"), later, the names of all Konrad's computers began to begin with the letter Z (Z1, Z2, Z3, etc. - by the initial letter of the inventor's surname).
The Z1 had most of the features of a modern PC. This is a binary code (Zuse far-sightedly abandoned the decimal system) 1 , and a separate memory block, and the ability to enter data from the console, and the processing of floating-point numbers. A punched card could be used as a data entry medium, which Zuse adapted to make from 35 mm film, punching holes in it. The Z1 had one serious drawback - the unreliability of calculations. The model was indeed experimental, although it could be used for scientific calculations. And, of course, it was not sold. By the way, for early computers (up until the boom of IBM PC-compatible computers in the early 1980s), the implementation rate was very important and served as a kind of indicator of success. However, Z1 was not destined to remain even in a single original copy. In 1943, the computer was destroyed after an air bombardment, along with all design drawings and diagrams 2 .
Key features of Z1
|
Implementation |
Thin metal plates |
|
Frequency |
|
|
Computing block |
|
|
Average calculation speed |
Multiplication - 5 seconds |
|
Data input |
|
|
Data output |
|
|
Memory |
64 words 22 bits |
|
The weight |
About 500 kg |
Unfortunately, Konrad Zuse did not escape being sent to the location of military units - Nazi Germany unleashed the Second World War. However, Zuse did not have to stay long in the role of an infantry soldier, no more than six months, the inventor managed to convince the military leadership that he would bring more benefits not on the battlefield, but behind the construction of a new computer (now known as Z2). The Institute for Aerodynamic Research of the Third Reich even began funding Zuse's work; in 1940, he was able to open a small company "Zuse Apparatebau" to create computers, which lasted until the end of the war. The inaccuracy and unreliability of the Z1 (due to mechanical design complexity) prompted Zuse to turn to the use of electromechanical switches - relays, for greater accuracy in calculations (limited in funds, Zuse purchased decommissioned relays from telephone companies). The Z2's memory still consisted of metal plates, but the computing unit consisted of 800 relays. By the spring of 1939 the Z2 was ready. Further improvement of this "generation" of computers did not make sense, Zuse already saw the prototype of the future machine, which would be entirely relay and serve not only as a demonstration model.
Key features of Z2
|
Implementation |
Thin metal plates, relays |
|
Frequency |
|
|
Computing block |
Floating point processing, machine word length - 16 bits |
|
Average calculation speed |
Multiplication - 5 seconds |
|
Data input |
Keyboard, punched tape reader |
|
Memory |
16 words 16 bits |
|
The weight |
About 500 kg |
On 12 May 1941 in Berlin, Zuse presented the famous computer to the assembled scientists. The demonstration was a huge success. It is no coincidence that the Z3 is considered the first working, freely programmable computer in the world (its "competitors", Mark I and ENIAC appeared after 1943). True, he did not store the program in the memory of the Z3, for this the memory of 64 words was small, and Zuse did not strive for this. There was a drawback - the lack of implementation of a conditional transition.
However, the main problem was that the highest military officials of the Wehrmacht did not doubt the quick victory of German weapons, and therefore attached little importance to computers. This fact is indicative. One day, Zuse and his friend Helmut Schreier, an engineer by profession, turned to the generals for help with financing a computer built not on relays, but on vacuum tubes (Schreier's idea). The military, having heard that it would take about two years to build such a computer, rejected Zuse-Schreyer's idea, saying that Germany would win the war much sooner without the help of new electronic computing tools. Of course, after Hitler's attack on the USSR, fascist Germany would not have been helped by any computers, but the above case clearly shows (as well as the direction of Zuse to the front) that the German leadership did not understand the full potential of computer building. In this regard, the work on the "weapon of retaliation" ("Fau") is indicative, which either accelerated or slowed down depending on the successes/failures on the military fronts.
Main characteristics of Z3
|
Implementation |
Relay (600 - calculation block, 1600 - memory block) |
|
Frequency |
|
|
Computing block |
Floating point processing, machine word length - 22 bits |
|
Average calculation speed |
Multiplication, division - 3 seconds, addition - 0.7 seconds |
|
Data input |
Keyboard, punched tape reader |
|
Data output |
Lamp Panel (Decimal) |
|
Memory |
64 words 22 bits |
|
The weight |
About 1000 kg |
Until 1944, the Z3 was successfully used for aviation calculations, when, again, after the bombing, the computer was destroyed3. The unbending Konrad Zuse takes on the creation of the fourth computer - Z4.
The Z4, unlike its predecessors, had an enviable fate. The Zuse company was preparing the Z4 for mass production, but the fear of the bombing forced the incompletely debugged computer to be taken out of Berlin. Initially, they planned to hide it in an underground factory in Nordhausen, where V-rockets were assembled. But when Zuse, descending into a terrible dungeon, saw thousands of prisoners working (and dying) there, in inhuman conditions, he rejected this place with horror. So the Z4 was taken to the Bavarian Alps, where in the town of Oberoch Zuse met another outstanding German inventor and designer, Wernher von Braun, who became famous for creating the first combat ballistic missile (A-4/V-2)4. Zuse did not join von Braun, who was marching briskly as a prisoner, but, after walking another 20 km, he hid the disassembled computer in the shed of the Alpine hotel in the town of Hinterstein. The post-war years were an ordeal for Zuse, who had to practically reassemble the Z4. To restore mechanical memory, they took iron cans left by the troops of the anti-Hitler coalition. To somehow survive, Zuse used his second talent - the artist. He made woodcuts and sold them to local farmers and American soldiers. In 1948, the restored Z4 was transported on horseback to the town of Hopferau, where Zuse was visited by Professor Stiefel from the ETH Zurich (ETHZ). It is still not entirely clear where the professor found out about the Z4. This meeting was a turning point for the later life of Konrad Zuse. In front of Stiefel, he wrote the program, made a punched card and entered the data into the Z4. The result obtained was correct. Encouraged by this, Stiefel offered to rent the Z4. To sign a contract with ETHZ, Zuse registered the company "Zuse KG". I must say that the Zurich professor had no choice. At that time, he could only rely on the Z4, since it was impossible to get American computers, and Zuse's machine worked reliably (even despite the memory from metal plates), had a special block for creating programs, and a number of other advantages.
Key Features of Z4
|
Implementation |
Relay, memory - metal plates |
|
Frequency |
|
|
Computing block |
Floating point processing, machine word length - 32 bits |
|
Average calculation speed |
Notes
|
Konrad Zuse is a German engineer and computer pioneer. He is best known as the creator of the first truly working programmable computer and the first high-level programming language. Years of life: 1910-1995.
Zuse was born in Berlin and for a long time lived with his parents in the north of Saxony in the town of Hoyerswerda.
In 1935, Zuse was educated as an engineer at the Berlin Higher Technical School in Charlottenburg, which today bears the name of the Technical University of Berlin. Upon graduation, he went to work at the Henschel aircraft plant in Schönefeld, however, after working for only a year, he quit, coming to grips with the creation of a programmable calculating machine. Having experimented with the decimal number system, the young engineer preferred binary to her. In 1938, the first working development of Zuse appeared, which he called Z1. It was an electrically powered binary mechanical calculator with limited keyboard programming. The result of calculations in the decimal system was displayed on the lamp panel. Built with my own money and the money of friends, and mounted on a table in the living room of my parents' house, the Z1 performed unreliably due to the lack of precision in the execution of its components. However, being an experimental model, it was not used for any practical purposes.
The Second World War made it impossible for Zuse to communicate with other computer enthusiasts in Great Britain and the United States of America. In 1939, Zuse was called up for military service, but managed to convince the army commanders of the need to give him the opportunity to continue his development. In 1940, he received support from the Research Institute of Aerodynamics, which used his work to develop guided missiles. Zuse built a modified version of the calculator - Z2 based on telephone relays. Unlike the Z1, the new machine read instructions from perforated 35mm film. She, too, was a demonstration model and was not used for practical purposes. In the same year, Zuse organized the Zuse Apparatebau company to produce programmable machines.
Satisfied with the functionality of the Z2, in 1941 Zuse created an already more advanced model - the Z3, which today is considered by many to be the first actually operating programmable computer. However, the programmability of this binary calculator, assembled, like the previous model, on the basis of telephone relays, was also limited. Despite the fact that the order of evaluation could now be determined in advance, there were no conditional jumps and loops. Nevertheless, Z3 was the first among Zuse's computers to have practical application and was used to design the wing of an aircraft.
All three machines, Z1, Z2 and Z3, were destroyed during the bombing of Berlin in 1944. And in the next year, 1945, the company itself created by Zuse ceased to exist. A little earlier, the partially finished Z4 was loaded onto a cart and transported to a safe place in the Bavarian countryside. It was for this computer that Zuse developed the world's first high-level programming language, which he called Plankalkül.
Plankalkül is the world's first high-level programming language, created by the German engineer Konrad Zuse in 1942. Translated into Russian, this name corresponds to the expression "planning calculus".
The language was developed as the main tool for programming the Z4 computer, but it was also suitable for working with other computers similar to it.
Plankalkül supported assignments, subroutine calls, conditional statements, iterative loops, floating point arithmetic, arrays, hierarchical data structures, assertions, exception handling, and many other very modern programming language features.
Zuse described the possibilities of the Plankalkül language in a separate pamphlet. In the same place, he described the possible use of the language for sorting numbers and performing arithmetic operations. In addition, Zuse compiled 49 pages of Plankalkül programs to evaluate chess positions. He later wrote that he was interested in testing Plankalkül's efficiency and versatility with regard to chess problems.
Working in isolation from other specialists in Europe and the United States has led to the fact that only a small part of his work has become known. The full work of Zuse was published only in 1972. And it is quite possible that if the Plankalkül language had become known earlier, the paths of development of computer technology and programming could have changed.
Zuse himself did not create an implementation for his language. The first compiler of the Plankalkül language (for modern computers) was created at the Free University of Berlin only in 2000, five years after the death of Konrad Zuse.
Three years later, in 1949, having settled in the city of Hünfeld, Zuse created the company Zuse KG. In September 1950 the Z4 was finally finished and delivered to ETH Zürich. At the time, it was the only working computer in continental Europe and the first computer in the world to be sold. In this, the Z4 was five months ahead of the Mark I and ten months ahead of the UNIVAC. Zuse and his company built other computers, each of which began with a capital letter Z. The best known machines were the Z11, which was sold to the optical industry and universities, and the Z22, the first computer with magnetic memory.
In addition to general purpose computers, Zuse built several specialized computers. So, calculators S1 and S2 were used to determine the exact dimensions of parts in aviation technology. Machine S2, in addition to the calculator, also included measuring devices for measuring aircraft. The L1 computer, which remained in the form of an experimental model, was intended for Zuse to solve logical problems.
By 1967, Zuse KG had delivered 251 computers, worth about DM 100 million, but due to financial problems, it was sold to Siemens AG. Nevertheless, Zuse continued to conduct research in the field of computers, and worked as a specialist consultant for Siemens AG.
Zuse believed that the structure of the universe is similar to a network of interconnected computers. In 1969, he published the book "Computing Space" (German: Rechnender Raum), translated a year later by employees of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
In 1987-1989, despite suffering a heart attack, Zuse recreated his first Z1 computer. The finished model had 30,000 components, cost DM 800,000, and required 4 enthusiasts (including Zuse himself) to assemble it. The project was financed by Siemens AG along with five other companies.
For his contributions and early successes in the field of automatic computing, independently proposing the use of binary and floating point arithmetic, and designing Germany's first and one of the very first program-controlled computers in the world, in 1965 Zuse received the Harry Hood Memorial Prize, medal and $2,000 from the Computer Society.
After retiring, Zuse took up his favorite hobby - painting. Zuse died on December 18, 1995 in Hünfeld (Germany), at the age of 85. Today, several cities in Germany have streets and buildings named after him.
