TechHistory： The Story of The First Computer Bug

Welcome to another episode of Tech History. Today we're taking a look at the origins of the word bug and the story of how it started to become commonly used with computers. Nowadays the term bug in the context of anything related to technology refers to a flaw in programming design that may cause issues either minor or major in the program or application, in turn making it act in a manner unintended by the programmer. Even veterans in the field of programming may struggle to explain to you the origins of this word because although they may tend to question it, very few actually seek the answer. Some may point you to Admiral Grace Hopper, a computer scientist and a pioneer of computer programming who documented the first ever computer bug. However, the term bug was actually used to describe certain defects more than half a century before the incident that Hopper faced before today by a man credited to many inventions, most famously the light bulb and the motion picture camera, the man known as Thomas Alva Edison. In 1873, Thomas Edison was developing a quadruplex telegraph system which would allow up to four distinct telegrams simultaneously on a single wire. However, he came across an issue that he would later resolve using what's known as a bug trap, a measure that was taken in order to solve the issue, to get rid of the bug. Following this, in a series of notes in his notebooks and letters to people he corresponded with, he would frequently reference the word bug, using it to describe defects. One of the earliest mentions of the word would appear in one of Edison's letters to Western Union President William Orton on the 3rd of March 1878. In it, he states, You were partly correct. I did find a bug in my apparatus, but it was not in the telephone proper. It was of the genus Callbellum. The insect appears to find conditions for its existence in all call apparatus of telephones. It's difficult to understand this statement mostly due to the word callbellum, but an explanation provided in an article on Today I Found Out suggests that callbellum is not a genus of insect, but an obscure Latin joke, call referring to a telephone call and bellum being the Latin word for war or combat, implying that Edison is engaged in a struggle with this particular hardware glitch. And then, in a letter to Theodor Puskas, he describes what exactly a bug is, little faults and difficulties. Edison and his team, known as the Insomnia Squad, dedicated most of their nights trying to solve the bugs in his inventions, sacrificing their sleep. And so, many reporters would point this out in articles, and even specified Edison's use of the word bug. However, since this predates the invention of the computer, this word would most often be attributed to faults in engineering, issues that arise when putting together hardware, mechanical or electrical. The word would make appearances from there onwards, even in official dictionaries, defining it as a fault in any electrical apparatus, or specifically pointing towards issues with the quadruplex telegraph system. After this, the godly baffleball, created in 1931 to be the first ever mechanical pinball machine, stated in its poster, no bugs in this game, meaning to say that it was without fault. There were multiple mentions like this from then onwards, and all of them using it to describe some kind of defect. This word would start to see some popularity within the public when Isaac Asimov released his short story called Catch That Rabbit, which used the word to describe defects in a robot. The bottom line was, bugs were defects and anomalies. Its defining characteristic was that it led to events that was not designed to lead to. So, in 1947, when a team of engineers at Harvard University, working on the Harvard Mark II computer, also known as the Akinvideh calculator, traced an issue they were having to a literal bug in their system, it turned out to be quite a funny coincidence. Back in the day, computers were large and generated a lot of heat. Their swarm tended to attract certain flying creatures, such as flies or moths. These creatures would then enter into components of computers and cause issues. Such is the case of a moth that met its untimely death when it made its way into the relays of the Harvard Mark II and trapped itself between wires, causing consistent issues with the functioning of the computer. Grace Hopper, who was part of this team, would then go on to record this incident on a logbook with the moth pasted onto the pages, dated September 9th, 1947, describing it as the first actual case of a bug being found. Though Grace Hopper was not part of the discovery itself, she is known for the popularization of the word due to this specific record, which would make it common terminology between programmers and other computer scientists soon after. Both Thomas Edison and Grace Hopper point the word's origins to be of German, Welsh, Scottish, and Middle English, all terms that were used to describe monsters. The word debug was also used previously, the earliest traces of it pointing to a letter written by Robert Oppenheimer to Ernest Lawrence in October of 1944. However, it was only after Grace Hopper's incident that debugging started to mean removing bugs from computers. And so, although Grace Hopper isn't attributed with coining the word's bug or debug, we can be almost certain that it wouldn't have been used as widely as it is today when it comes to programs, softwares, and games if it wasn't for that one recorded incident in 1947. If it wasn't for that one moth that flew into the Harvard Mark II, seeking warmth and forever engraving its existence in history. Thank you so much for watching and I hope you have a fantastic day.