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Ada Lovelace

Front cover of issue 20 on Ada Lovelace: Silhouette of female head with pattern swirling from it

Computer Scientist without a Computer

2015 is the 200th anniversary of Ada Lovelace’s birth. Famous as 'the first programmer' her vision of computer science was far wider. To celebrate, this area explores her life, her ideas and where modern research has taken some of those ideas. Women’s research is also still at the forefront of interdisciplinary computer science. We will look at what other Victorian Computer Science was around at the time and also see how her work linked to the very modern idea of computational thinking.

Issue 20 of the cs4fn magazine is all about Ada Lovelace. Download the pdf. UK teachers can subscribe for free copies of the magazine - just fill out the request form

Victorian Computer Science

Creativity

Cogs and a Nebula cloud Ada Lovelace: Visionary

Becoming a Computer Scientist

A fan Geek gurl parties in the 1830's

Victorian Robots

A silver cyborg The Silver Lady

Secret Messages, Life and Death

A fan Dickens Knitting in code

Writing

Flying letters Ada Lovelace in her own words

Data Representation

A book of Braille in shadows Letters from the Victorian Smog

Human Factors

coloured pens Vulgar coloured pens

Well chosen names

coloured labels Tut, Tut! Look at your labels dear!

Puzzles and Graphs

The Bridges of Konigsberg Puzzling Victorian Doodles

Novels

Cartoon of Frankenstein's monster Frankenstein's Monster

Artificial Life

A creature hatching Pass the Screwdriver Please, Igor

The Real Frankenstein

Cartoon of Frankenstein's monster A Storm in a Bell Jar

Electricity

Electricity arcing Following Faraday

Neuroscience

Red brain glowing in a skeleton Brain Matter

Crowd Sourcing

A Barnacle Victorian volunteers needed

Mathematics

Two people thinking maths The Social Machine of Maths

Evolution and Intelligence

DNA manipulated by a robot arm Clever Genes

Bioengineering

A heart with electical signal Model a heart

Quantum Computers

Ball bearings scattered Balls, beams and quantum computers

Media

Ball bearings scattered Cartoons, comics and computer games

Flight and Languages

Angel made of clouds Autopilot Ada!

Languages

Audience The Decline and Fall of Ada: Who’s popular now?

The Computer Revolution

Female head, swirling pattern Looking to the future

Flight

Hand reaching to bird Back (page) in the air

Victorian Computer Science

Cogs and a Nebula cloud The foundations of computing laid in the 18th century

Women in Computing

Cover of women are here issue: woman's head with coogs Women still lead the way

This area and much of the research described in it has been supported by EPSRC. This issue and/or the research in it has been supported by the EPSRC project : The Social Machine of Mathematics on research grants (EP/K040251/2). It has also been supported by the Department of Education and Mayor of London through LSEF project teachinglondoncomputing.org and Google.