Programmer (hardware) - History

History

In the early days of computing, before terminal and graphical display devices, a programmer was a device used to configure a program for a computer. It usually consisted of switches and LEDs, where instructions had to be entered one by one by setting the switches in a series of "on" and "off" positions. The positions of the switches corresponded to computer instructions, similar to how assembly language is used today. Such hardware programmers are almost never seen or used today.

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