Describe Hollerith’s approach to processing information by machine.
It was not later that an improved way came along. Henry Hollerith an engineer by profession innovated, and improved way of storing and processing data. He developed punched cards to record the information.
A total of 56 million cards were used to tally data obtained from 62 million people. Each card stored data equal to 36 eight-bit byte type of information. It allowed the 1890 census to yield far better results than anticipated. It also took only two years to complete the census, and also saved 5 million dollars.
The punched cards had hole in patterns to store information. The machine counted the number of holes and gave results. Hollerith’s method revolutionized the way information was stored and processed.
It led to the belief that the machine could now take over human cognitive functions, this induced both hope and fear. Hollerith established his own enterprise and named it ‘Tabulating Machine Company’. He sold it in 1911 and it was renamed as the ‘Computing-Tabulating-Recording. That company is now known as ‘International Business Machine’.