Software Engineering

99
6.2 
Evolution of software technologies
The advances of software as a technology can be better appreciated by viewing 
a timeline of software-related technologies. 
Figure 6.2
 provides a 70-year overview 
of the evolution of selected advances in computer technology and programming 
languages.
2
 This figure highlights the prominent programming languages that ena-
ble the development of software products. The highlights associated with software 
programming between 1945 and 1985 are presented in 
Table 6.3
.
3
 Programming 
began as a specialized craft practiced by laboratory technicians working toward 
advancing computing systems. These scientists originally worked in machine code 
(binary 1’s and 0’s) to program very simplistic computations on very large comput-
ers with vacuum tubes. Machine code is a set of instructions executed directly by a 
computer’s central processing unit (CPU).
FIGURE 6.2
Timeline of selected computer and programming technologies.
2 
See 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_computing
 and 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_ 
of_programming_languages
.
3 
See 
http://www.computerhistory.org/timeline/?category
=
sl
.

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