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The Machines That Sparked the Beginning of the Computer Age

Posted by samzenpus on from the in-the-beginning dept.

jjp9999 writes "A war of spies and electromechanical machines that took place beneath the wires during World War II not only played a crucial role in the Allies' victory, but also helped spark the beginning of the computer age. Among the devices was the Enigma, a cipher capable of producing 150,000,000,000,000,000,000 possible code combinations, and a hulking machine, the Colossus, the first programmable electronic computer, capable of decoding the Enigma."

9 of 139 comments (clear)

  1. American Crypto better than Enigma by cold+fjord · · Score: 5, Informative

    In these discussions it is common to overlook Sigaba, the American encryption machine that was significantly more secure than Enigma.

    SIGABA was similar to the Enigma in basic theory, in that it used a series of rotors to encipher every character of the plaintext into a different character of ciphertext. Unlike Enigma's three rotors however, the SIGABA included fifteen, and did not use a reflecting rotor.

    Electronic Cipher Machine (ECM) Mark II

    The ECM Mark II based cryptographic system is not known to have ever been broken by an enemy and was secure throughout WW II. The system was retired by the U.S. Navy in 1959 because it was too slow to meet the demands of modern naval communications. Axis powers (primarily Germany) did however periodically break the lower grade systems used by Allied forces. Early in the war (notably during the convoy battle of the Atlantic and the North Africa campaign) the breaking of Allied systems contributed to Axis success.

    Cryptanalysis of the SIGABA --- 3.4 Stepping Maze

    While other rotor-based cryptosystems tended to rotate their rotors as an odometer (with the last rotor moving one position per letter, and each other rotor moving one position when the rotor after it completes a full cycle), the SIGABA introduces
    an innovative concept. The movement of its cipher rotors depend on the two other rotor banks, collectively known as the stepping maze. The output of the stepping maze is not seen directly, but rather controls the movements of the cipher rotors. Thus, the SIGABA uses a hidden cryptosystem within another cryptosystem.

    The Germans that beat their heads against it referred to it as, "The big machine".

    --
    much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
  2. Colossus was *not* used to break Enigma by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    IIRC Colossus was used to break the Lorenz ciphers, not Enigma. BP were using the Bombs with menus for Enigma.

    1. Re:Colossus was *not* used to break Enigma by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Oops, that should have been "bombe" not "bomb". Good info here:

      http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/content/machines.rhtm

  3. Re:Allies were the villians in WWII by nickovs · · Score: 3, Informative

    Sadly, while the poster is clearly trolling with his deliberately lopsided history, the US did put well over 100,000 Japanese Americans into internment camps. These camps, while offering better conditions in most respects, bore far too close a resemblance to concentration camps for anyone with a conscience. look it up is you need to know more.

    --
    If intelligent life is too complex to evolve on its own, who designed God?
  4. Connections - Faith in Numbers by peterofoz · · Score: 4, Informative
    Anyone who is serious about computing should watch this Connections episode by James Burke that takes you from the water wheel and jacquard loom to modern day computing. Its simply amazing.

    Connections - Episode 4 - "Faith in Numbers"

  5. Re:Thanks for the update Big Ben by rssrss · · Score: 3, Informative

    But, this does give us a chance to recommend the excellent biography of Alan Turing which explains his role in the evolution of computer science and his role in breaking the German cyphers:

    "Alan Turing: The Enigma" by Andrew Hodges

    --
    In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
  6. Re:Um...isn't this NEWS for nerds? by arth1 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Thomas Edison was a really awesome inventor

    Thomas A. Edison was a really awesome businessman, opportunist, and quite possibly the world's first patent troll. Very few of the inventions he has been credited for were actually invented by him, the person. Sometimes by employees of Edison, and sometimes these were foreign inventions, bought or outright filched, and then patented in the US by Edison.

  7. Re:Um...isn't this NEWS for nerds? by GrahamCox · · Score: 3, Informative

    Thomas Edison was a really awesome inventor

    No, he wasn't. You've fallen for the hype (mostly created by Thos. Edison himself).

  8. Article omits relevant information by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Amazingly the article omits to tell us about Konrad Zuze:

    "Konrad Zuse (German pronunciation: [knat tsuz]; 22 June 1910 Berlin – 18 December 1995 Hünfeld near Fulda) was a German engineer and computer pioneer. His greatest achievement was the world's first functional program-controlled Turing-complete computer, the Z3, which became operational in May 1941. He received the Werner-von-Siemens-Ring in 1964 for the Z3.[1] Much of his early work was financed by his family and commerce, but after 1939 he was given resources by the Nazi German Government.[2]
    Zuse's S2 computing machine is considered to be the first process-controlled computer. In 1946, he designed the first high-level programming language, Plankalkül.[3] Zuse founded one of the earliest computer businesses on 1 April 1941 (Zuse Ingenieurbüro und Apparatebau).[4] This company built the Z4, which became the world's first commercial computer."

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konrad_Zuse