History of Software “Bug”

BUG ME NOT

We cannot imagine the world without computers today. But no person or machine is perfect. Everyone make mistakes. That is true for computers also. It is really frustrating when the computer problem does not allow you to do further work. These problems or faults are called as “Computer Bugs”. These are not real bugs but are just the mistakes in computer design or programming causing a failure. So, where did the term “bug” came from?

The term “Bug” is used to describe a defect for many decades. Thomas Edison used it for the first time in 1878 to describe any fault in electrical connections or problem with mechanical devices. Also, the problems with radar electronics during world war II were referred as bugs. Then the phrase “Bug in telephone cable” was used to refer noisy lines. But the term “Computer Bug” and “Debugging” was first used by Grace Hopper (known for inventing COBOL) in 1945. There is an interesting story behind it.

Grace was working on a project at Harvard University where she worked on the world's first large-scale computer, Harvard Mark I. She was fascinated by the huge machine consisting of relays, switches, vacuum tubes etc. After Mark I, she was working on Harvard Mark II – electromechanical computer. One day (9^th September, 1945), while she was testing Mark II relay calculator, she found that it was not functioning properly and had some problem. Upon investigation, the team found something unusual between point at relay #70, panel F. They identified that there was a moth (insect/bug) trapped in relay which was causing a problem. The team removed the moth and the detailed report was written about the problem with the explanatory note - “First actual bug being found”. That is the first time anyone used the word bug to describe computer glitch.From then on, if anything goes wrong with computer, we say that it has bugs!! Also, they debugged (removed the bug) the machine to fix the problem and the term “Debugging a computer program” was born.

 This was all about how the words “Bug” and “Debugging” were born. Wasn't it interesting to find about the origin of words and how the various meanings of words are evolved over a time?

Post By :- Anagha 

Published By :- Pardha Saradhi