Moving Targets

Moving Targets charts the gradual take-up of Information Technology in Britain, as seen through the eyes of one innovative company Elliott-Automation and remembered by those who worked for that company. The story touches on the strategic, technical and economic history of the 1950s and 1960s, through such themes as: secret computers built for the Admiralty and for GCHQ at Elliott s Borehamwood Laboratories; the changing balance between analogue and digital techniques; the challenges of commercial data processing and the marketing arrangement between Elliott and NCR; the introduction of low-cost, reliable computers and their application to industrial control and to avionics; the growing importance of software and the Elliott Algol compiler; and the market rivalry between the Elliotts and other British computer manufacturers such as English Electric and Ferranti Ltd.§Simon Lavington, M.Sc., Ph.D., FIEE, FBCS, is emeritus professor of Computer Science at the University of Essex and the author of many publications. He retired in 2002 and is a committee member of the BCS Computer Conservation Society.This book charts the take-up of IT in Britain, as seen through the eyes of one company. It examines how the dawn of the digital computer age in Britain took place for different applications, from early government-sponsored work on secret defence projects, to the growth of the market for Elliott computers for civil applications. Features: charts the establishment of Elliott s Borehamwood Research Laboratories, and the roles played by John Coales and Leon Bagrit; examines early Elliott digital computers designed for classified military applications and for GCHQ; describes the analogue computers developed by Elliott-Automation; reviews the development of the first commercial Elliot computers and the growth of applications in industrial automation; includes a history of airborne computers by a former director of Elliott Flight Automation; discusses the computer architectures and systems software for Elliott computers; investigates the mergers, takeovers and eventual closure of the Borehamwood laboratories.The Elliott-Automation company was an active participant in the birth of the information age in Britain. By 1961, the company was supplying 50% of the digital computers delivered to UK customers in that year. Yet by the end of that decade, Elliott-Automation had effectively disappeared in a flurry of takeovers, leaving little apparent trace of the technical excellence that had once characterised the name Elliott.Moving Targets charts the gradual take-up of information technology in Britain, as seen through the eyes of one innovative company. The book examines how the dawn of the digital computer age in Britain took place at various times for different applications, from early government-sponsored work on secret defence projects, to the growth of the market for Elliott computers for civil applications.Topics and features:Charts the establishment of Elliott s Borehamwood Research Laboratories in 1946, and the roles played by John Coales and Leon Bagrit in reviving an ailing companyExamines early Elliott digital computers designed for classified military applications and for GCHQ, such as the Elliott 152, 153 and OEDIPUSDescribes the analogue computers developed by Elliott-Automation, including the giant TRIDACReviews the development of the first commercial Elliott computers, the growth of applications in industrial automation, and the competition offered by rival manufacturers in BritainIncludes a history of airborne computers up to 1988, written by a former director of Elliott Flight AutomationDiscusses the evolution of computer architectures and systems software for the Elliott 800, 900 and 4100 series computersInvestigates the mergers, takeovers and eventual closure of the Borehamwood laboratories, and the demise of Elliott-Automation and its successors, ICL and GECThis unique text will be of great interest to historians of technology and business, and will also appeal to the general reader curious about the emergence of digital computing in Britain and the work of the previously unsung computer pioneers of the Elliott-Automation laboratories at Borehamwood.Simon Lavington is Emeritus Professor of Computer Science at the University of Essex. Among his many publications is the book Early British Computers.