Browsing: Inventions

A Brief History On February 26, 1991, English computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN of Switzerland) introduced his invention of the WorldWideWeb to the public, the first publicly available internet browser. Berners-Lee is now a professor at Oxford University in England and has authored several books about computers and the internet. Digging Deeper In 1989 Berners-Lee had implemented the first successful communication between a server and an HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) user via the internet, and also invented the HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) to support his invention of the WorldWideWeb, developments that made browsing…

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A Brief History On February 25, 1836, Sam Colt patented his cap and ball revolver that would give rise to all the modern revolvers that followed. Early attempts at revolvers in the flintlock era were disasters waiting to happen, as all too often the firing of one cylinder would set off the others as well. Over the years some iconic revolvers have been produced, and until the late 20th Century they remained the sidearm of choice for police and private citizens (although the semi-automatic pistol had superseded revolvers for military use for the most part as of the early 20th…

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A Brief History On February 16, 1968, the first emergency 9-1-1 (we prefer 911) system was put into service in Haleyville, Alabama, a town of about 4100 people. Part of the North American Numbering Plan (NANP) of telephone numbering systems, 911 is a rapid way for people to dial the police or emergency rescue services such as fire fighting or ambulance service. Covering the United States and Canada, 911 service is available in about 98% of all locations in these 2 countries. Digging Deeper In addition to connecting the caller with an emergency dispatcher, about 96% of the United States…

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A Brief History On February 8, 1879, Scottish Canadian inventor and engineer Sandford Fleming proposed the adoption of Universal Standard Time at The Royal Canadian Institute. Fleming proposed that the world be divided into 24 time zones, each 15 degrees of longitude in breadth and sequentially one hour behind the preceding time zone. All land within each time zone would be set to the same time. Up until this time, clocks in every city and town had been set to local time based on each location’s position on the Earth, creating no standards of keeping time and mass confusion when…

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A Brief History On February 2, 1935, Leonarde “Nard” Keeler testified about polygraph evidence in a Wisconsin courtroom at a trial of 2 men for assault, the first use of the polygraph, often simply called “the lie detector,” in court. Then, as now, debate about the efficacy of the polygraph was fiercely defended on both sides. Digging Deeper Keeler was the co-inventor of the polygraph, a machine that measures bodily functions in response to questions being asked the subject of the test, the reaction of those functions supposedly indicating whether the subject is telling the truth or a lie. Bodily…

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