History of Software
The history of software deals with the origins, evolution and the different events that have occurred throughout the existence of software.
We understand software as the part or intangible factor of computing and computing that makes it possible for hardware to be useful. Examples of this are operating systems or applications.
Therefore, the software cannot exist without the intervention of the hardware and vice versa, so both terms need each other in order to have some use or utility.
Software Origin
Software as a theoretical term has its origin in two outstanding events.
The first refers to the development of an algorithm designed for a specific machine, such as the 'analytical machine' in its time in the mid-nineteenth century. This machine in the end was not made and the algorithm was not put into practice. The programmer of the first software 'protopiece' was Ada Lovelace, the first woman programmer in history.
The second event that occurred was a work by Alan Turing that was based on computable numbers, so we would be facing the first software theory of all time. This happened shortly before the middle of the 20th century.
Summarizing, it can be said that software is a term that has been in use for relatively few years, so it is a science that still has a long way to go.
Historical stages of the software
We can divide the history of software into the following stages, starting from its origin to its situation in the 21st century:
- Stage before 1950: These are decades in which the first foundations and brushstrokes of software are laid. As mentioned in the previous section, Ada Lovelace and Alan Turing are the forerunners of the 'software' concept.
- Decade of the 50's, 60's and 70's: In these years the software went from being a theoretical and abstract concept to being recognized as an indispensable factor for the invention and development of devices or machines. The term 'software engineering' is coined for the first time at a NATO conference. This is the first sample of one of the most studied and correspondingly demanded sciences and professions. At that time the most widely used languages were COBOL and FORTRAN.
- Decade of the 80's and 90's: In these two decades a problem is identified, and that is that the great demand exceeded the supply of professionals in the industry. In addition, professionals could not cover so many areas of knowledge without prior specialization. The first collapses arose in projects and works of advanced complexity. Without going any further, at this time Windows was launched in 1985 and Linux in 1992. In addition, the appearance of the HTML language is thanks to the rise of the World Wide Web (WWW), one of the main milestones of the digital age.
- 21st century: Since the beginning of the 21st century there have been great advances in all fields covered by software. Since the appearance of the revolutionary smartphone, with integrated software that makes it possible for a single device to perform tasks that previously required a computer. On the other hand, levels of development have also been reached in technologies yet to be investigated and developed, such as AI or the already well-known cryptocurrencies.. Examples of these advances are the voice assistants of large companies such as Apple, Microsoft or Amazon, which can imitate human behavior. For these purposes, there are many programming languages in which the objective of the project determines which language should be used and therefore, what specific type of professional is needed. Some languages that we can mention are SWIFT (for applications in iOS environments), JavaScript (for web environments) or PHP (intended for tasks and programming of servers or physical machines).
As has been observed, the history of software is not excessively long but it is very intense, since many evolutions and ramifications of it arise throughout its historical journey. Proof of this are the numerous programming languages and the tens of thousands of projects that have been carried out based on them.