Manchester computer architectures, 1948-75
Simon Lavington · IEEE Annals of the History of Computing · 1993
It is suggested that, because of changes in computer technology and terminology, it is often difficult for present-day observers to judge the significance of early digital computer projects. The author discusses some architectural themes of interest, as they evolved in the design of three innovative computers developed at the University of Manchester: the Mark I, Atlas, and MU5. Themes such as operand address generation, instruction formats, and memory management are traced for the period 1948 to 1975. These themes are illustrated by a set of normalized diagrams that may aid further study of the original references.>