电子专业外文翻译---电子学的发展

附录二：中英文翻译：

The develop of Electronics（computer）

Electronics is a part of the larger field of electricity. The basic principles of electricity are also common to electronics. Modern advances in the fields of computer, control system, communications have a close relationship with electronics.

The field of electronics includes the electron tube, transistor, integrated circuit and so on

Electronics began in 1883, when Thomas Edison discovered the vacuum diode as part of his research on materials for a practical electric light. This first electronic device exhibited a nonlinear, unilateral characteristic but was not capable of producing amplification of a signal. In 1905 Fleming produced the first diode in England and in 1906 DeForest made the first triode in the United States. The widespread applications of vacuum tubes during that time period were in the communications industry, first in radio and later in television. The use of vacuum tubes declined rapidly when a semiconductor device was invented that could perform many of the functions previously associated with vacuum tubes.

The first large digital electronic system was a special-purpose vacuum tube circuit called the electronic numerical integrator and computer (ENIAC). The ENIAC was the forerunner of the computer industry. the early transistor was invented in 1984 and made a significant contribution to electronics. The early transistors were made from germanium. The most visible application of these devices was in small, portable AM broadcast receivers. Silicon transistors began to replace germanium transistors in the late 1950s, which made possible the next revolutionary step in electronics.

The commercial success of the integrated circuit industry was based on standard products representing digital logic families. The integrated circuit industry was moving from the era of small-scale circuits to large-scale integration (LSI). As the decade of the 1970s came to a close, a new era in integrated circuits was beginning. This era is characterized by the inclusion of larger and larger and larger numbers of components in a single circuit, and it is called very large-scale integration (VLSI).

Electronic technology is developing rapidly in the world. And electronics industry is equipped it make yet another giant step forward.

A computer is a machine that accepts and processes data into information under the control of a stored program. Data are facts or observations, while information is the meaning we attribute them.

A computer is a data processing machine. Data flow into the machine as input. Information flows from the machine as output. The computer processes the data. These three basic concepts of input, processing and output occur in almost every aspect of human life whether at work or at play.

What do we mean when we say that a computer processes data? Process implies that a change takes place. For example, in clothing manufacturing, input is the pieces of cut cloth. The processing is the sewing together of these pieces. And the output is the finished garment. Often, data processing involves filtering and summarizing data so that underlying and output.

What makes a computer different from a calculator?

We know that when adding two numbers on a calculator to find the sum, it requires direct human intervention at each step. A computer can process data automatically without human intervention. However a computer is not intelligent. It doesn’t know when to add, or subtract, or compare, or request input. If it is to function without direct human control, it must be given a set of instructions to guide it, step, through a process. The set of instructions is called a program. The program is stored physically inside the machine, making it a stored program. It is the stored program that distinguishes a computer from a calculator.

Modern computers vary in physical size from those that fill rooms to those that with CPUs the size of a dime. Generally, the larger the system, the greater its processing speed, storage capacity.

Systems on the low end of the size scale are called microcomputers, whose central processor is built as a single semiconductor device, called the microprocessor. Continuing up the size scale, mainframe computers are systems that may offer faster processing speeds and greater storage capacity than a typical microcomputer. Finally come the supersystems, designed to process complex scientific applications. These systems are the largest, fastest.

Computers are thought to have many remarkable powers. In the past, a complex computation would take years of human remarkable power. In the past, a complex computation would take years of human work. But now it can be done in a few seconds. A number of various complicated problems could not be solved in the