TechComputing History
The first documented computer bug was a literal moth.
On 9 September 1947, engineers traced a fault in Harvard's Mark II computer to a moth crushed in a relay, and taped the insect into the logbook with the caption 'First actual case of bug being found'. The joke worked because 'bug' was already old engineering slang — and the moth is now in the Smithsonian.
Step by step
- On 9 September 1947, Harvard's Mark II computer failed a test.
- Engineers found a moth crushed in a relay and taped it into the logbook.
- The caption — 'First actual case of bug being found' — was a joke; 'bug' was already slang.
- The logbook, moth and all, now lives at the Smithsonian.
Source
This fact is written from the English Wikipedia article it links to, so you can check every word in one tap. Fact Drop rates that source 4 out of 5 for credibility, and the rating travels with the fact on the back of its card in the app.
More tech facts
Tech facts about the machines you use every day. Your colour printer hides its serial number on every page, the close-door button in most lifts does nothing, and Bluetooth is named after a Viking king. Sourced, short and a little unsettling.
- Ctrl-Alt-Delete was never meant for you.
- The Apollo guidance computer's program was stored by threading wire through or around tiny magnetic rings — a one or a zero per pass.
- The first computer program was written for a machine that was never built.
- Grace Hopper handed out 30 cm lengths of wire to explain why satellite calls lag.
- The first computer mouse was carved out of wood.
- IBM's first gigabyte hard drive shipped in 1980.