General- and Specific-Use Computers
Key Concepts |
| Specific-Purpose Computers are specialized for a single task | Early computers were made to perform one (1) or a limited set of similar tasks. Today we used these types of computers to make our homes smart and our traffic flow smoothly |
| General-Purpose Computers are designed to handle a variety of software needs | Computer hardware evolved into a standard configuration. This allowed many different specific-purpose software packages to be created that all run on the same general hardware |
Introduction
Computers, originally a job title for someone that performed calculations, evolved as trade and commerce grew. It became necessary to maintain good accounts of sales, transactions, and inventory to be a successful business person.
As technologies, such as mechanical devices and material science progressed, it became advantageous for business people to use computing devices, rather than people. Devices don't get sick, make errors, or steal. They are reliable and consistent.
Specific-purpose computers solve specific problems, but as science, math, and the use of technology increased, it became obvious that a single device that can solve many different problems (General-Purpose computer) was needed.
Specific-Purpose Computers
Early computers were specific-purpose devices. They were built to solve one (1) problem or calculate one (1) value. These devices were imagined, designed, built, and executed with a specific task in mind. As such, these devices were often designed and built with components that were best suited to solve that problem. They would be very good (efficient, accurate, etc) at performing that task. There was little compromise in design or construction of specific-purpose computers.
The predecessor to the common Abacus is an early example of a Specific (or Special) Purpose Computer device. The Sumerian Abacus dates back to Mesopotamia in 2700 BCE.
Early Chinese Abacus
Modern specific-purpose computers include traffic light controllers, ear buds, smart home devices, and automotive engine control computers
General-Purpose Computers
By contrast, general-purpose devices are designed and built to solve known and unknown problems. They are made with standard resources, such as memory and input/output peripherals, to be able to support tasks with various resource needs.
Today's modern desktop computer is a well-known general-purpose device. While today's computers are designed and manufactured by various companies, and are filled with parts from different suppliers, they function in the same general way (more on this when we discuss the von Neumann Architecture).
Software became the specific-purpose element of modern computers. Each specific software packages, running on the same general hardware, can solve many different problems.
Any person can create a program to solve any problem using a modern computer. It may take a very long time to solve the problem. Fortunately, modern computers are built with some expandable resources. So, to solve a problem that require many mathematic calculations we can upgrade parts (such as CPU or RAM) to make the calculation execute faster. Without the upgrades, the problem can still be solved, it will just take longer to calculate the result.
And, if a particular problem has very specific elements that would be prohibitively slow on a general-purpose computer, a specific-purpose device could be designed to increase speed and/or accuracy.
Conclusion
Early computers were developed to do a single, simple task. They were designed solely for that tasks, and therefore optimized to execute their function.
As computers evolved, it was advantageous to design general-purpose hardware that could run standard software. The software became the specific-purpose elements that all can run on any standard computer hardware.