LEO editor

http://www.nickpelling.com/Leo1.html The business cases behind the five proposals made to the board of J. Lyons & Co. by Thompson and Standingford in 1947 – which led to the construction of the first business computer – are analysed, but found to be strategically lacking. Both an alternate reading of the case and some contemporary implications are then developed.

Pearcey wrote;

In the non-mathematical field there is wide scope for the use of the techniques in such things as filing systems. It is not inconceivable that an automatic encyclopaedic service operated through the national teleprinter or telephone system, will one day exist.”

The article by Piercey who may is honoured as father of Australian computing may be considered prescient much as the LEO project at that time.

manuscript typescript of a paper prepared by John Pinkerton with the help of Derek Hemy one month after John joined Lyons. The paper attempts to provide an analysis of how long it would take to prepare a payslip under various assumptions about input/facilities. A copy of the transcribed document is held in Dropbox in Word and PDF format. https://www.dropbox.com/s/hr062jv7rnabnh1/John%20Pinkerton%20EDSAC%20payroll%20paper_1949.docx?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/cbji9iikgtjm3ge/John%20Pinkerton%20EDSAC%20payroll%20paper_1949.pdf?dl=0

Electronic Engineering, Vol. 23., pp. 147-148.

Copy No 1′ of a 63 page report on the LEO computer for J Lyons & Company Ltd. including text and ‘small block schematic diagrams’ for submission to the Patent Office. The report has the handwritten and stamped mark ‘88147 Presented 27 July 1951’ as well as being stamped ‘Patent Office Library, 27 July 1951’. Listed in the report and included with it are 65 larger diagrams all stamped ‘Patent Office Library, 27 July 1951’. BL Explore Archives and Manuscripts catalogue. The catalogue number is Add MS 89294 http://searcharchives.bl.uk/IAMS_VU2:IAMS032-003391654

GB000000767192A 29.05.1952 30.01.1957 JOHN MAURICE MCLEAN PINKERTON; LYONS & CO LTD J
Improvements in and relating to data transfer apparatus. Complete Specification published January 1957. See https://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/originalDocument?CC=GB&NR=767192A&KC=A&FT=D&ND=4&date=19570130&DB=EPODOC&locale=en_EP

Proceedings of a Symposium held at National Physical Laboratory, March 1953, pp. 21-30, published by HMSO. Key points from the article include:

in building the “calculator” (i.e. LEO) Lyons’ intention was to get it into operation as quickly as possible because they felt that until it had actually been in use over a period of time for clerical purposes, “the optimum form of such equipment could not be decided”.
Pinkerton states that modifications and “additional features” were required to the EDSAC design that the LEO is based on “to make the installation effective on clerical work” and that this included a “larger store, means for introducing data into and extracting results from the calculator much faster than was possible with the EDSAC, and a foolproof method of checking data recorded to the machine”. Pinkerton suggests that although LEO has been in use for over 18 months, it is “not yet as reliable as would be necessary for carrying out a regular and intensive programme of clerical work”.  http://www.chilton-computing.org.uk/acl/pdfs/Automatic_Digital_Computation_Symposium_Mar53_text .pdf

page32, see

Electronic Engineering, Vol. 29, pp. 284-291. Reprinted as part of ‘LEO –Lyons Electronic Office’ in Electronic Engineering, pp. 3-10.

Automatic Data Processing, December.

• The Computer Journal, British Computer Society, Vol. 4, No. 1, pp. 42-46.