How the Analytical Engine Weaves Concepts Like a Loom
The distinctive characteristic of the Analytical Engine, and that which has rendered it possible to endow mechanism with such extensive faculties as bid fair to make this engine the executive right-hand of abstract algebra, is the introduction into it of the principle which Jacquard devised for regulating, by means of punched cards, the most complicated patterns in the fabrication of brocaded stuffs. It is in this that the distinction between the two engines lies. Nothing of the sort exists in the Difference Engine. We may say most aptly that the Analytical Engine weaves algebraical patterns just as the Jacquard-loom weaves flowers and leaves.
Richard Taylor, Sketch of the Analytical Engine invented by Charles Babbage Esq. By L. F. Menabrea, of Turin, Officer of the Military Engineers (1843)
Notes
Lovelace's remarkable description of the Analytical Engine compares it to the Jacquard-loom, which was also programmable.References
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Analytical Engine, executive right-hand, distinctive characteristic, extensive faculties, bid fair, abstract algebra, complicated patterns, Difference Engine, algebraical patterns, stuffs, Jacquard-loom, distinction
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principle, sort, means, leaves, introduction, Jacquard, cards, fabrication, engines