In 1945 a revolutionizing concept was invented which would change the way programming was performed. A scientist named John Von Neumann working at the prestigious Institute for Advanced studies in Princeton, New Jersey created two programming models. John named the models as “Shared Program Technique†and “Conditional Control Transfersâ€.
John was very concerned about the fact that the ENIAC was a success even though it used a lot of technology that was similar to the previous technologies. The ENIAC was a computer that had a complicated structure and was of undefined physical dimensions. Sometimes the computers were so large that they would occupy an entire floor. John suggested that a computer should have a simple structure and its size should be smaller than usual.
This is what John has tried explaining in the “Shared Program Technique†model. He created awareness among people that a computer need not be as large as they used to be at that time. He also told them that a computer can be a lot faster if they are programmed in a complicated structure instead of the simple mechanism that was used to design them those days. These ideas gave way to the high speed computers of today’s generation.
The main idea behind this kind of programming was to keep the computer busy all the time. As the computers of those days used to perform a single operation at a time and then used to enter wait state till the next instruction is received. So with the help of “Shared Program Technique†subroutines were created which helped in programming the computer so that it will be in busy state most of the time for the optimum utilization of the processor.
In the second model viz, “Conditional Control Transferâ€, John informs us that instead of performing the program in a specific sequence i.e. line after line, there should be use of jump statement. He also suggests the use of conditional programming which is popularly known by IF-ELSE loop in today’s world. With the help of these two models the computers became much more efficient and