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The stepped reckoner was based on a gear mechanism that Leibniz invented and that is now called the Leibniz wheel. It is unclear how many different variants of the calculator were made. Some sources, such as the drawing to the right, show a 12-digit version. [5] This section describes the surviving 16-digit prototype in Hanover. Leibniz wheel
A Leibniz wheel or stepped drum is a cylinder with a set of teeth of incremental lengths which, when coupled to a counting wheel, can be used in the calculating engine of a class of mechanical calculators. Invented by Leibniz in 1673, it was used for three centuries until the advent of the electronic calculator in the mid-1970s.
A pinwheel calculator is a class of mechanical calculator described as early as 1685, and popular in the 19th and 20th century, calculating via wheels whose number of teeth were adjustable. These wheels, also called pinwheels, could be set by using a side lever which could expose anywhere from 0 to 9 teeth, and therefore when coupled to a ...
Leibniz built two Stepped Reckoners, one in 1694 and one in 1706. [6] The Leibniz wheel was used in many calculating machines for 200 years, and into the 1970s with the Curta hand calculator, until the advent of the electronic calculator in the mid-1970s. Leibniz was also the first to promote the idea of an Pinwheel calculator. [7]
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (or Leibnitz; [a] 1 July 1646 [O.S. 21 June] – 14 November 1716) was a German polymath active as a mathematician, philosopher, scientist and diplomat who is credited, alongside Sir Isaac Newton, with the creation of calculus in addition to many other branches of mathematics, such as binary arithmetic and statistics.
[2] [3] It was first described in 1837 as the successor to Babbage's Difference Engine, which was a design for a simpler mechanical calculator. [ 4 ] The analytical engine incorporated an arithmetic logic unit , control flow in the form of conditional branching and loops , and integrated memory , making it the first design for a general-purpose ...
Leibniz constructed just such a machine for mathematical calculations, which was also called a "stepped reckoner". As a computing machine, the ideal calculus ratiocinator would perform Leibniz's integral and differential calculus. In this way the meaning of the word, "ratiocinator" is clarified and can be understood as a mechanical instrument ...
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz: Gottfried Wilhelm (von) Leibniz (1 July 1646 [O.S. 21 June] – 14 November 1716); German polymath, philosopher logician, mathematician. [1] Developed differential and integral calculus at about the same time and independently of Isaac Newton.