CODEX

Microprocessors Running on Air?

There was a time, now forgotten, where the expectation was that computers would run on fluid currents rather than electric currents.

Basic building blocks of a Fluidics based system.

Logical gates can be made in almost any fashion. Today we build logical gates such as AND, OR, NAND, and XOR gates using combinations of transistors. However, this is not the only way to do it. Earlier computers used vacuum tubes instead of transistors. Before that relays were used. One of the first programmable computers the Z1, made by Konrad Zuse during WWII used mechanical logical gates.

Read more: Implementation of Konrad Zuse’s Logical Gates in Lego.

Before talking about air-based computers, I want to introduce you more broadly to the history of how computer systems have been built through the ages. Because this story is in many ways about what could have been historical. Silicon-based microprocessors are here to stay. But sometimes it is fun to imagine “what if?”

Mechanical Decimal Number Based Computers

If you go far back into computer history, to the age of steam, you will find the mechanical monsters dreamt up by computer pioneers such as Charles Babbage, who made steam-powered mechanical computers…