TREAC facts for kids

TREAC or the TRE Automatic Computer was one of the very first computers ever built in Britain, and indeed, in the whole world! Imagine a time when computers were just starting to appear – TREAC was one of those pioneers.

History of TREAC

TREAC was created by a group of smart scientists and engineers at the Telecommunications Research Establishment (TRE). This place was located in Worcestershire, a county in England.

During the late 1940s and early 1950s, many brilliant minds were working on computers. The University of Manchester was also a big player in developing early computers. Interestingly, many people who worked on computers at Manchester had actually worked at TRE before!

TRE was a very important place, especially during World War II. They developed a lot of the electronic equipment, like radar systems, that helped the United Kingdom during the war. This experience in electronics was super helpful when they started building computers like TREAC.

How TREAC Was Developed

TREAC was built in the early 1950s. It was a truly groundbreaking machine for its time.

One of the coolest things about TREAC was that it produced the first computer-synthesized music! This means it was one of the first computers to ever make music using its own calculations, which was a huge step for both music and computer science.

TREAC ran its very first computer program in 1953. As technology improved, by 1958, people could write many different kinds of programs for it.

How did people talk to TREAC? All the information, both going into the computer and coming out, was handled using punched paper tape. Think of it like a long strip of paper with holes punched in it, where the holes told the computer what to do.

TREAC was also special because it was a parallel computer. This means it could do several calculations at the same time, rather than one after another. It was the first computer in the UK to work this way, making it much faster for certain tasks.

The End of TREAC

TREAC was a fantastic machine, but technology keeps moving forward! It was finally switched off in 1962. It was replaced by an even newer computer called the Royal Radar Establishment Automatic Computer (RREAC). RREAC was special because it was the UK's first solid-state computer. This means it used newer, smaller electronic parts instead of older, bulkier ones, making it more reliable and efficient.

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