A page of text printed in the two-color ditto process, which would have allowed less than 100 copies.
Creative Commons LicenseJeremy Norman Collection of Images - Creative Commons
A page of text printed in the two-color ditto process, which would have allowed less than 100 copies.
Images from the first published edition of Wilkes, Wheeler and Gill's textbook
Image Source: www.peterharrington.co.uk
Images from the first published edition of Wilkes, Wheeler and Gill's textbook. On the left we see the EDSAC stored program computer. On the right we see a programmer working with programs on punched paper tape.
Dust jacket for the second edition of the book published in 1957.
Image Source: archive.org
Dust jacket for the second edition of the book published in 1957. The first edition is was issued with a an unprinted dust jacket of plain brown paper. Demand was so limited initially that it took six years to sell out the first edition (1951).
Detail map of Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States,Cambridge, England, United Kingdom

A: Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, B: Cambridge, England, United Kingdom

Wilkes, Wheeler & Gill Create the First Treatise on Software for an Operational Stored-Program Computer

1950 to 1951
Prepublication privately printed ditto'd version of what became the Wilkes, Wheeler and Gill first textbook on programming.
Creative Commons LicenseJeremy Norman Collection of Images - Creative Commons
Prepublication privately printed ditto'd version of what became the Wilkes, Wheeler and Gill first textbook on programming.

In 1950 Maurice Wilkes, David Wheeler, and Stanley Gill of Cambridge University issued Report on the Preparation of Programmes for the EDSAC and the Use of the Library of Subroutines. This dittoed document, published for private distribution in a very small number of copies, was the first treatise on software written for an operational stored-program computer. The book described “assemblers” and “subroutines”—segments of programs that are frequently used, so they can be kept in “libraries” and reused as needed in many software applications. The Cambridge group thus introduced the concept of reusable code, one of the principal tools for reducing software bugs and improving the productivity of programmers.

In 1951 this work was published as a conventional hard-cover book, with some changes and a new title by the American publishers Addison-Wesley, coincidentally in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Preparation of Programs for an Electronic Digital Computer, with special reference to the EDSAC and the use of a library of subroutines was the first conventionally published book on software. (See Reading 9.4.)

Timeline Themes

Software
Publishing