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Why does Grace Hopper get a pass for outright lying for decades about this?
It’s apocrypha. I’m not sure that Grace Hopper ever actually claimed to invent the term “bug,” only that others have claimed that she did.
The log book entry that says, "First actual case of bug being found", indeed always seemed like a piece of humour to me. The presence of the word "actual" in the entry makes sense only if the term "bug" to mean defects is already established in the industry. If this log book entry really were the first time a bug was found in a computer, it would have merely said, "a bug was found", not "first actual case of bug". Im…
Yep, nobody got presented awards for the "First World War".
I'd just like to say that Thomas Edison's handwriting in his letter is absolutely beautiful. It almost looks like it's been typed out on a computer using a funky font. It's funny how the handwriting of almost everyone I know is quite bad these days. My own is almost illegible! I wonder what everyone thinks about this general degradation in penmanship? I guess it's not really needed in this day and age, but there's so…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I looked up letters written by other 20th century scientists, the average looks pretty good: Marie Curie: https://catalog.archives.gov/id/7722951 Tesla: https://www.benjamindecasseres.com/nikola-teslas-letter-to-b... They all seem to have this really "flowy" style
>...They all seem to have this really "flowy" style. I guess, the flow was needed to literally maintain the flow of ink off the pen.
No one claimed it was??
This whole article could've been saved if the author'd realized what a JOKE was.
> Considering the relatively small size of the team who worked on the Mark II, I’m hopeful to eventually get a definitive answer to this.
And then...never does provide an answer.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep, nobody got presented awards for the "First World War".
or for the First Battle of Bull Run during the Civil War.
[1] Kid-detective series where the titular character, Leroy "Encyclopedia" Brown, solves crimes by finding inconsistencies that require domain knowledge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encyclopedia_Brown
> This was not the origin of term “bug” being used for engineering — including computer software. No one claimed it was?? This whole article could've been saved if the author'd realized what a JOKE was. > Considering the relatively small size of the team who worked on the Mark II, I’m hopeful to eventually get a definitive answer to this. And then...never does provide an answer.
I have seen multiple claims that this is the origin of the word bug, at least in software. Including my first CS teacher explaining where the word bug came from. But, I always suspected there was at least some element of myth to the story. Granted, such renditions didn't have the exact quote from the logbook.
> And then...never does provide an answer.
Presumably, they haven't found the answer yet
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep, nobody got presented awards for the "First World War".
People did actually start calling WW1 "The first world war" long before WW2 started. There is even few instances of that terminology going back to 1914. They were pessimistic there would be more.