Computer bug: Difference between revisions
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#REDIRECT [[Software_bug]] |
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A '''computer bug''' is any problem with a computer, whether caused by software or hardware. |
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The term "bug" was in use among engineers and repairmen well before the dawn of the [[Computer Age]]{{citation needed|date=May 2013}}. |
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American engineers have been calling small flaws in machines "bugs" for over a century. Thomas Edison talked about bugs in electrical circuits, in a letter to a friend, in 1878{{citation needed|date=May 2013}}. When the first computers were built during the early 1940s, people working on them found bugs in both the hardware of the machines and in the programs that ran them{{citation needed|date=May 2013}}. |
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By 1945 it seems the term was used for any defect: In the March 3rd 1945 ''Billboard Magazine'', a Review on page 11 notes{{citation needed|date=May 2013}}: "There are still a number of bugs to shake out, but if we were a sponsor, we'd buy it fast". |
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Yet, credit for popularizing the term is generally accorded to computer pioneer [[Grace Hopper]], who it is said, in September 1947, "...traced an error in the [[Harvard Mark II|Mark II]] to a moth trapped in a [[relay]]. The [[Hemiptera|bug]] was carefully removed and taped to a daily log book. Since then, whenever a computer has a problem, it's referred to as a bug." |
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<ref>{{cite web|url=http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_334663|title=Log Book With Computer Bug|work=[[National Museum of American History]]}}</ref> |
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<ref>{{cite web|url=http://ids.si.edu/ids/dynamic?id=NMAH-92-13130&container.fullpage|title=Smithsonian Images - log book}}</ref> |
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==See also== |
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* [[Software bug]] |
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==References== |
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{{Reflist}} |
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==External links== |
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*[http://features.techworld.com/applications/3301346/moth-in-the-machine-debugging-the-origins-of-bug/ Moth in the machine: Debugging the origins of "bug"] - Did Grace Hopper really invent the term "bug" to describe software errors? - ''[[Computerworld]]'' staff - September 5, 2011 |
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[[Category:Software bugs]] |
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[[Category:Hardware bugs]] |
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{{Comp-hardware-stub}} |
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{{Software-stub}} |
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Revision as of 16:24, 6 June 2013
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