Martin Wiberg (4 September 1826 – 29 December 1905) was a Swedish

inventor An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea, or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an ...

. He enrolled at

Lund University Lund University () is a Public university, public research university in Sweden and one of Northern Europe's oldest universities. The university is located in the city of Lund in the Swedish province of Scania. The university was officially foun ...

in 1845 and became a

Doctor of Philosophy A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of Postgraduate education, graduate study and original resear ...

in 1850. He is known as a computer pioneer for his c. 1859 (1857-1860) invention of a machine the size of a

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that could print logarithmic tables (first interest tables appeared in 1860, logarithmic in 1875). The

logarithm In mathematics, the logarithm of a number is the exponent by which another fixed value, the base, must be raised to produce that number. For example, the logarithm of to base is , because is to the rd power: . More generally, if , the ...

ic tables were subsequently published in English, French and German in 1876. The device was investigated by the French academy of science which also wrote an extensive report on it in 1863. The device was inspired by the similar work done by

Per Georg Scheutz Pehr (Per) Georg Scheutz (23 September 1785 – 22 May 1873) was a Swedish lawyer, translator, and inventor, who is now best known for his pioneering work in computer technology. Life Scheutz studied law at Lund University, graduating in 1805. He ...

(had the same capacity: 15-digit numbers and fourth-order differences) and has similarities with Charles Babbage's

difference engine A difference engine is an automatic mechanical calculator designed to tabulate polynomial functions. It was designed in the 1820s, and was created by Charles Babbage. The name ''difference engine'' is derived from the method of finite differen ...

. (Scheutz machine was based on the difference engine). The device is preserved at

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(The Technical Museum) of

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. Wiberg failed to sell his machine, and also failed to sell the output tables due to their bad looks.

Nordisk familjebok (, 'Nordic Family Book') is a Swedish language, Swedish encyclopedia that was published in print from between 1876 and 1993, and that is now fully available in digital form via Project Runeberg at Linköping University. The public domain edit ...

, Uggleupplagan, page 202 Apart from this invention, Wiberg invented numerous other devices and gadgets, among these a cream separator and a

pulse jet engine In medicine, the pulse refers to the rhythmic pulsations (expansion and contraction) of an artery in response to the cardiac cycle (heartbeat). The pulse may be felt (palpated) in any place that allows an artery to be compressed near the surface ...

. None of these were commercially successful.

See also

References

Further reading