Computer History Museum

So this is me at the Computer History Museum.
Good architecture outside. So I was going to expect
a small part from the women in ENIAC since I read
Jennifer Light's essay "When Computers Were
Women."

First, I walked in CHM and went one of the exhibitions.
This weird looking thing is the first one I saw.
This is Lehmer Sieve and was created by Derrick
Norman Lehmer. It is being said that the design influenced
the design of sieves for software.

Aaah...the Apple computer. Whaat! It's a prototype
of Apple I created by Steve Wozniack. Aaa!
Another male. Where's ENIAC?


This is the stored program from ENIAC. YAY!
ENIAC proposed that the machine should store
instructions within an internal memory but later
they used a plugboard wiring scheme. This was
proposed by John von Neumann.
Then EDVAC came along which stored instructions
in a mercury delay line memory. This was designed
by J. Presper Eckert, John Mauchly, John von
Neumann, and others" Still no women contributed.
Maybe "others" consist of women but who knows.

This huge machine is Electrodata E-205 which
is bought by Burroughs and it was for business
and scientific users. Great! Where's the women
in ENIAC?

This is the magnetic tape which is used to store digital
information. What do you know? It was made by two
males: Eckert and Mauchly.Aargh! Where is the women in ENIAC!


This is WISC (Wisconsin Integrally Synch-
ronized Computer). This is the tool that helps
students in new-fields of computing. The machine
was a rotating drum as it perform 4 arithmetic
operations at once. Again it was devised by
a man: Gene Amdahl which create the ground-
breaking System360 for IBM.

Disappointed. Couldn't find any women in
computers in this exhibition.

So I left and went to see CHM's special exhibition
of Charles Cabbage's Difference Engine. The engine
automatically calculates and tabulates polynomials.
Cabbage died before he even start it but in the late
20th Century, London Science Museum designed
the machine according to Cabbage's notes with a few
exceptions.

After 35 minutes of listening to a war veteran
telling us the information and details of the Cabbage's
machine, I decided to go to other exhibition rooms
for women in ENIAC but I saw some photos on the
hallway.
This is Seymour Cray who is individuals billed him
"father of supercomputing" at the console of his
CDC 6600, 1964. Still no women in ENIAC. :(

This is a UNIX at DEC PDP-11. You guess it.
Both are men: Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie
and no women in ENIAC.

Aarrgghhh!!!!!!!


Whoa! Finally a woman. This is Grace Hopper,
which she was a computer pioneer, in front of UNIVAC.
But still no women from UNIAC. So that was the
end of the hallway pictures.

This device is hard disk. We have come a long
way from this BIG to this small as of today.
This was sought out by a Michigan teacher,
Rey Johnson. But still no women in ENIAC.




This is the PalmPilot. It was purchased by U.S.
Robotics to 3Com to Handspring (the Visor was made)
Handspring chairman was Jeff Hawkins and a woman
CEO, Donna Dubinsky and ED Colligan was Senior VP.

Again no women in ENIAC. My time was up and I left
the Computer History Museum disappointed of not
seeing the women in ENIAC's projects.

After going home, I checked Computer History Museum's
website and checked their Fellow Awards and found out
about Jean Jennings Bartik. She created the ENIAC
computing machine in 1945.

What I don't understand is that there's no picture of her
in the exhibition room but has a picture on their website.

I hope CHM can have something the women in ENIAC did
and display in their museum in the future.

Proposal

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Wilson Hu

Maraffi

Session 2:30-3:30 Friday

4 November 2009

Enviro-Domination

Game Form:

Enviro-Domination is an idea that came from James Bond's "Never Say Never Again. You can read more about it here on the description of the game in the movie: http://www.fuk.co.uk/threads/james_bond_question

Instead of world domination, I wanted to create an online game with the idea of philanthropy for the environment. I wanted to do the same format as in the movie except for the electric shock and toning the money down to four levels:

Level 1; each hit $0.10 and the 60 per cent of the money will be paid by the loser and 40 per cent of the money will be paid by the winner

Level 2; each hit $0.50 and the 60 per cent of the money will be paid by the loser and 40 per cent of the money will be paid by the winner

Level 3; $1 and the 60 per cent of the money will be paid by the loser and 40 per cent of the money will be paid by the winner

Level 4: $10 and the 60 per cent of the money will be paid by the loser and 40 per cent of the money will be paid by the winner

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Before the start of the game, both players must enter their credit card numbers which the website will be VeriSign^TM secured. Then, the two players will choice one country. The website will provide detailed and short information of a country’s environmental status and will be

ranked from needed to a little in money sense to help the country environmental problem. After clicking the country they wish to donate, target areas of the country will light up on the interface.

Whoever hits them first with the laser beam will score points and the player with the higher percentage of successful shots out of hundred percent wins. But there’s another way to win by pushing ‘M’ on your keyboard, you control two of your missiles and punching ‘S’ on your keyboard, you control the shield to block the opponent’s missiles. If you fail to block a missile, you opponent wins. The up-down-left-right button on your keyboard is your jog stick to move the laser to a blank target.

The two players that played the game will pay the amount to the listed non-governmental organization for a certain country. The non-governmental organization will report to the two players of how the money is being spent and the progress of their money through video.

Film Form:

In a separate event for this project is to let the players make a thirty second video for promoting this website. This will be implementing at two or three years. They can collaborate with other players who participated in the game and use the footage from the environmental group which will be provided extensive before and after footage and various scenes of progress big or small from the money was used from the people who played the game. This will be done annually and will be in a competitive manner. What I meant of competitive manner is that various people that are sign on to the website can vote for the best and creative promo for this

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site on a ten point scale. A movie maker program will be supplied on the website as a convenience tool to help the people to make the thirty second clip. The best one will show the amount of effort that the money from people who played the game and the people in the environmental organization has done.

Into the future:

If this project is successful, I wanted to do something massive if I can get sponsorships to promote this event. Each Earth Day (I planned to seek March 20 date instead of the US Earth Day which is April 22^nd because March 20^th is where the United Nation celebrates the Earth Day-this way it can be a global event rather than just a United States event) there will be a global tournament of the game. A player from ‘X’ country will play a player from the same country. The two players will play for the organization from their own country. For example, United States players will be paired with United States players and the money goes to any United States environmental group or African players will be paired with African players and the money goes to any African environmental group. At the end of the day, a live announcement of the total amount of money raised from the global audience playing the game will be on the website.

Larger Audience in the future:

If the website is popular, I have plans to sell the rights of the game to Yahoo Games for a much bigger and larger audience. This can create a much greater exposure to this cause. I really like the ideas of the rooms or lounges Yahoo Games has created for their board games, pool games, etc. If this is successful, the game will be in the Yahoo Games rather than on my website. I will let Yahoo games administrators to take care of the credit transaction (which the players do before playing the game). When they sign up on the Yahoo server, the server will transfer the

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information of the players from my server for the website. When they finish the game, a link will appear on the page that will lead to my original webpage which will lead the players to the video response from the environmental group in the future. Also it will ask them to create a creative promo for the website in the future as well

Usage Scenario:

James—The Curious

James saw an advertisement for Enviro-Domination on an online chat forum. James clicked on the link. He tried a short demo game as it takes him through the process of the game. He was pleased and he was willing to try the game. As he watched the demo and seeing the VerignSign, he trusted the site so he decided to give his credit card information to the site. He saw some people on the site. He chose a country that he wanted to help and found another player of the same country he wanted and they played the game. They selected level one which is $0.01 per hit. It was a close game as James heat 55% of his shots. The loser was asked to pay 60% of the amount total and James paid 40%. After they made their transaction and the pick of the environmental organization from the country they selected, they were told that they would receive a video response from the organization. Also they were told that they could make a video from this site in the future after the organization has made the video response.

Production:

One computer especially any Apple Intel Duo Core 2 can be used to design the game and a server to store information from the users. The programmer will be using C++ to design the game and the game will be keyboard-oriented. Please see page two of the controls on the keyboard. For the domain name for this website, first I need to ask individuals who hold rights to

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the films of James Bond if I can use the name Domination. If that is successful, I would able to use envirodomination.com. The game part involves participating and interaction of their keyboard while the film part is a collaborate effort from players as well as environmental organizations. I will need at least ten moderators for the website. I would need four moderators for United States, four moderators for China, and two moderators for Russia.

Tasks:

Day 1-3: Ask individuals who hold rights to the films of James Bond if I can use the name Domination. If that is successful, I would able to use envirodomination.com.

Day 4 (it depends): If the rights of using the name “Domination” is pass through, the domain name http://www.envirodomination.com will be implemented