EGAD

WEIZAC

WEIZAC gathering dust in the lobby of the Applied Math building at the Weizmann Institute. 2004:11:25 13:42:13

A couple of weeks ago, I ran across this Jerusalem Post article on WEIZAC, the first computer in the Middle East. Seems that the thing's 50th anniversary arrived, for some definition thereof. (As best I can tell, it didn't actually begin operations until more like 1956.) Two things struck me in reading the article. One is that Einstein needed some convincing that a computer was a wise investment for Palestine. The other is that it is still here, gathering dust in a corner of the Comp. Sci. department.

So, time for a quick photojaunt.

[29 Jan 05 Update: In the comments, Estrin points out that, had I been able to get the full text of the '91 Annals article, I would have seen that WEIZAC actually did begin working in 1955. I stand corrected.]

A closer look at the glassed-in innards of WEIZAC. Somehow I doubt it was quite that easy to get inside when the beast was running. I guess they probably threw out the gigantic power supplies and coolers that it would have required. 2004:11:25 13:45:32

WEIZAC was one of the IAS machines. The original was designed by John von Neumann at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study, and hashed out the concepts on which our digital electronic computers are based. In fact, we still call them von Newmann architecture machines, although that's considered somewhat unfair to the builders of ENIAC, which worked in much the same way.

I did mention the part about it gathering dust, right? And where's this gigantic memory core I read about? 2004:11:25 13:44:24

At any rate, the design for von Newmann's machine at Princeton was given away to all and sundry, including a student of his named Jerry Estrin who came to Israel in '53 to build one of the fifteen known descendants of that system. Much is made of the claim that there were no applicable parts, tools, or skills in the country prior to his arrival, and that it thus had to be cobbled together from bicycle parts and large components given by wealthy donors. The rest, evidently, is history, and to this day Israel sports a kick-ass information technology industry. (Good thing they weren't counting on tourists or anything.)

But poor Einstein! The late '40s roll around and he's stuck in committee meetings being hauranged into giving his approval for the Institute to dump a fifth of its budget into some newfangled computer. (And probably still leery of randomly approving things after the incident with the letter, too.) Fifty years earlier -- in fact, 100 years ago next year -- he was changing the world. Hey, I'd be perfectly happy just to publish five papers in a year.