Transcode Manual.

£4,500 · Offered by Shapero Rare Books

canada's grace hopper First edition of the only separately published work by computing pioneer Beatrice Worsley (1921-2003) and the founding document of Canadian computer science: the manual for using Worsley's Transcode system for the Feranti Mark I. Rare; we can locate only one other copy, at the University of Toronto, where the text was prepared. This copy is from the library of Queens University, Kingston, Ontario, where Worsley spent the final part of her career. As a student Worsley excelled at science and earned her undergraduate degree in mathematics and physics at the University of Toronto. Immediately after graduating in 1944 she enlisted in the Women's Royal Canadian Naval Service, working on ship degaussing and hull corrosion. In 1946 Worsley began graduate studies at MIT, writing an important master's thesis, A Mathematical Survey of Computing Devices, 'a fascinating snapshot of contemporary computing technology' (Campbell, Beatrice Helen Worsley: Canada's Computing Pioneer, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, 2003). Worsley became firmly committed to computing as a career, and in 1948 she joined the new University of Toronto Computation Centre. She was sent to Cambridge to study the new EDSAC, arriving with a colleague to find it 'in a fairly advanced state of construction, and though neither had an engineering background, both helped prepare it for the first run on 6 May 1949' (Campbell). Her report on the initial results was later published in the importa

• Binding: Hardcover

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