Noun
difference engine (plural difference engines)
(computing, historical) A mechanical special-purpose computer used to generate tables of values of polynomials.
By improving the concept as an analytical engine, Babbage had made the difference engine concept obsolete, and the project to implement it an utter failure in the view of the government. Source: Internet
For The London Science Museum 's difference engine, the first one actually built from Babbage's design. Source: Internet
Martin Wiberg (1826-1905) was a prolific inventor who, among many things, created the first difference engine the size of a sewing machine that could calculate and print logarithmic tables. Source: Internet
Babbage's difference engine No. 2, finally built in 1991, could hold 8 numbers of 31 decimal digits each and could thus tabulate 7th degree polynomials to that precision. Source: Internet
Operation The Mountain View machine in action The difference engine consists of a number of columns, numbered from 1 to N. The machine is able to store one decimal number in each column. Source: Internet
July September * July 3 Charles Babbage publishes a proposal for a " difference engine ", a forerunner of the modern computer for calculating logarithms and trigonometric functions. Source: Internet