Research

It's a little hard to determine what was the first portable or laptop computer. The first portable computers did not look like the book-sized and folding laptops that we are familiar with today, however, they were both portable and lapable, and lead to the development of notebook style laptops.

Welcome to "The Glamorous History of Portable Computers." This is a constantly expanding timeline that aims to capture the greatest moments in mobile computing.

Definition of Laptop: A laptop computer, or simply laptop (also known as notebook computer, notebook, notepad, and incorrectly labtop ;), is a small portable computer having its main components (Processor, screen, keyboard) built into a single unit capable of battery powered operation, which usually weighs 2-18 pounds (approximately 1 to 8 kgs), depending on dimensions, materials, and other variables.

The internet is an innovation (or rather a series of innovations) that enables communication and transmission of data between computers at different locations. It is an extremely new scientific development, but that does not mean that we cannot analyse it historically, using the concepts that we apply to other innovations in the past.

The Internet didn't just 'happen', there were hundreds of discoveries, achievements and a lot of deep thinking that had to be done before the Internet could come into existence.

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What is the Internet ? The Internet is a worldwide system of interconnected computer networks that use the TCP/IP set of network protocols to reach billions of users. The Internet began as a U.S Department of Defense network to link scientists and university professors around the world.

The Internet had its roots during the 1960's as a project of the United States government's Department of Defense, to create a non-centralized network designed to survive partial outages (ie. nuclear war) and still function when parts of the network were down or destroyed. This project was called ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), created by the Pentagon's Advanced Research Projects Agency established in 1969 to provide a secure and survivable communications network for organizations engaged in defense-related research.

1969 - Birth of a Network The Internet as we know it today, in the mid-1990s, traces it origins back to a Defense Department project in 1969. The subject of the project was wartime digital communications. At that time the telephone system was about the only theater-scale communications system in use. A major problem had been identified in its design - its dependence on switching stations that could be targeted during an attack. Would it be possible to design a network that could quickly reroute digital traffic around failed nodes? A possible solution had been identified in theory. That was to build a "web" of datagram network, called an "catenet", and use dynamic routing protocols to constantly adjust the flow of traffic through the catenet. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) launched the DARPA Internet Program.

The Original Text of the Article: This timeline is a biased perspective giving weight to computing advances that directly aided collaboration among human beings. 1833: Charles Babbage (1792-1871) abandons Difference Engine No. 1, a mechanical calculator. British government losses: 17,470 pounds, enough to purchase two battleships.