Computer History

Through narratives and case studies spanning the brilliant history of engineering, Madhavan shows how the concepts of prototyping, efficiency, reliability, standards, optimization, and feedback are put to use in fields as diverse as transportation, retail, health care, and entertainment. Equal parts personal, practical, and profound, Applied Minds charts a path to a future where we apply strategies borrowed from engineering to create useful and inspired solutions to our most pressing challenges.

The acclaimed editor of The New York Times Book Review takes readers on a nostalgic tour of the pre-Internet age, offering powerful insights into both the profound and the seemingly trivial things we've lost. Remember all those ingrained habits, cherished ideas, beloved objects, and stubborn...

En nuestro panorama digital en rápida evolución, el concepto de PERPLEXITY ha surgido como una medida fundamental de la incertidumbre, la comprensión y los límites del conocimiento.

This visionary book reimagines robots not as copies of human movement, but as creators of entirely new forms of motion. From flying, gliding, swimming, and wall-crawling, to swarming, shape-shifting, and moving matter without touch, robots will revolutionize how we live, work, create, and dream. Exploring industries, cities, sports, and the arts, the book shows how dynamic motion will transform architecture, rescue missions, manufacturing, entertainment, and everyday life.

Hoy en día, el mundo se vacía de cosas y se llena de información inquietante como voces sin cuerpo. La digitalización desmaterializa y descorporeíza el mundo. En lugar de guardar recuerdos, almacenamos inmensas cantidades de datos. Los medios digitales sustituyen así a la memoria, cuyo trabajo hacen sin violencia ni demasiado esfuerzo. La información falsea los acontecimientos.

“It is possible to invent a single machine which can be used to compute any computable sequence,” twenty-four-year-old Alan Turing announced in 1936. In Turing’s Cathedral, George Dyson focuses on a small group of men and women, led by John von Neumann at the Institute for Advanced Study...

Liquid Computing envisions a future beyond apps and interfaces—a world where artificial intelligence is ambient, adaptive, and seamlessly embedded in daily life. In this era, we don’t “use” computers; we live inside intelligent flows that span devices, contexts, and interactions. The book traces the evolution from hardware to cloud to AI as a responsive, invisible operating medium—always learning, assisting, and co-creating with us. It introduces the Liquid Interface, where interaction is natural, multimodal, and emotionally aware. Instead of commands, we converse.

Technology rules us as much as laws do. It shapes the legal, social, and ethical environments in which we act. Every time we cross a street, drive a car, or go to the doctor, we submit to the silent power of technology. Yet, much of the time, the influence of technology on our lives goes unchallenged by citizens and our elected representatives. Our embrace of novel technological pathways, Sheila Jasanoff shows, leads to a complex interplay among technology, ethics, and human rights.

After the Apollo program put 12 men on the moon and safely brought them home, anything seemed possible. In this spirit, the team at NASA set about developing the space shuttle, arguably the most complex piece of machinery ever created.

"This is the most important book on Silicon Valley I've read in two decades. It will take us all back to our roots in the counterculture, and will remind us of the true nature of the innovation process, before we tried to tame it with slogans and buzzwords." -- Po Bronson, #1 New York Times...

Barely 50 years ago a computer was a gargantuan, vastly expensive thing that only a handful of scientists had ever seen. The world's brightest engineers were stymied in their quest to make these machines small and affordable until the solution finally came from two ingenious young Americans. Jack Kilby and Robert Noyce hit upon the stunning discovery that would make possible the silicon microchip, a work that would ultimately earn Kilby the Nobel Prize for physics in 2000.

Plastic built the modern world. Where would we be without bike helmets, baggies, toothbrushes, and pacemakers? But a century into our love affair with plastic, we're starting to realize it's not such a healthy relationship. Plastics draw dwindling fossil fuels, leach harmful chemicals, litter landscapes, and destroy marine life. As journalist Susan Freinkel points out in this engaging and eye-opening book, we're nearing a crisis point.

In time for Apple’s 50th anniversary, CBS Sunday Morning correspondent David Pogue tells the iconic company’s entire life story: how it was born, nearly died, was born again under Steve Jobs, and became, under CEO Tim Cook, the most valuable company in the world. The book features full-color...

Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V killed craftsmanship — speed now pretends to be intelligence, and repetition masquerades as reasoning. A brutal manifesto against the decay of real software engineering. This book is not a tutorial. It’s not a course. It’s a call to arms.

„Wie KI unsere Zukunft gestalten wird“ ist in einem leicht verständlichen Stil geschrieben und widmet sich einer der zentralen Fragen unserer Zeit: Was können wir von der rasanten Entwicklung der KI erwarten? Wie wird sie unser Leben und unsere Gesellschaft in den kommenden Jahrzehnten verändern?

Kenneth is senior director of research and innovation at CoreAVI and chief technology officer at Squint AI. His work focuses on the intersection of artificial intelligence and determinism, enabling neural networks to execute in safety critical systems. Kenneth has co-authored two articles in the scholarly journal Machine Learning with Applications and several white papers for different publications, including Embedded Computing Design. He also holds several patents under CoreAVI’s auspices.

The volumes of data we now access can give unparalleled abilities to make predictions, respond to customer demand, and solve problems. But Big Brother’s shadow hovers over it. Although big data can set us free and enhance our lives, it has the potential to create an underclass and a totalitarian state. With big data ever present, you can’t afford to ignore it. In this book, acclaimed science writer Brian Clegg - a habitual early adopter of new technology - brings big data to life.

Today, Artificial Intelligence seems mystical and magical to most people. While this wave of change will touch every aspect of our daily lives, most of us still do not understand AI’s capabilities, limitations, or history. In this book, Dr. Alok Aggarwal – one of the early innovators and developers in this field – sets out to demystify Artificial Intelligence by explaining the science and engineering in non-technical terms we can all understand.

The first-ever inside look at DARPA—the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency—the maverick and controversial group whose futuristic work has had amazing civilian and military applications, from the Internet to GPS to driverless cars America's greatest idea factory isn't Bell Labs...

New technologies are offering companies, politicians, and others unprecedented opportunity to manipulate us. Sometimes we are given the illusion of power—of freedom—through choice, yet the game is rigged, pushing us in specific directions that lead to less wealth, worse health, and weaker democracy.