Let's Talk About Her： Ada Lovelace

Mathematical science shows what is. It is the language of unseen relations between things. But to use and apply that language, we must be able to fully appreciate, to feel, and to seize the unseen, the unconscious. These words, written almost 200 years ago, came from a brilliant mathematical mind, who, though now credited with creating the first program ever, was widely unknown until the 1950s. In this video, learn about Ada Lovelace, a pioneer almost erased from programming history. My name's Liv. Let's talk about her. Augusta Ada Byron, Countess of Lovelace, better known as Ada Lovelace, was born in London in 1815 to Lady Anne Isabella Byron and a famous poet at the time, Lord Byron. Her parents' marriage was short-lived and unhappy, which led to a separation between them when Ada was only a few weeks old, which resulted in Ada barely knowing her father. To ensure that her daughter ended up nothing like her ex-husband, Ada's mother made sure that Ada's tutors focused on teaching her mathematics and science instead of the arts. This was very unusual, as schooling for women at the time, even amongst the upper class, was usually focused on skills that would benefit them when they were Even as a child, Ada was talented in mathematics and in learning new languages. She was considered a brilliant young mind by those who knew her. At the age of 12, Ada even attempted to design a flying machine almost 80 years before the first plane was invented. When Ada was only 17, she met and became fast friends with the mathematician Charles Babbage. Charles Babbage, considered the took Ada under his wing and became her mentor. He demonstrated to her a model of the invention he was working on, called the Difference Engine. This machine, which was meant to calculate numbers, is considered one of the earliest prototypes of computers. Ada was immediately fascinated by it and took to translating articles about the machine to learn more. Ada created the very first program when she translated one of these articles. During translation, Ada added more and more notes until she ended up creating an article three times longer than the original. Within the added notes, Ada mentioned that the machine could be used to calculate Bernoulli numbers and provided an algorithm that could work to do that. This algorithm is considered by many to be the first program that was ever written. The machine itself wasn't actually built until 2002, so it was never tested in her lifetime. This means that even without testing her algorithm, Ada was able to figure out the logic it would take, which is no small feat. After Ada created the very first program, she continued to learn and share all she could about algorithms. The rest of her life was spent socializing with some of the most influential people of the time. It was found that she was very good friends with both Michael Faraday and Charles Dickens. She eventually married William King, who became the Earl of Lovelace, thus making her known as Ada Lovelace. Her husband was a great ally to her cause and greatly encouraged her ambitions and thirst for knowledge. Upon discovery of the article almost 100 years after her death, historians found that she was also a visionary, predicting that computers might do more than just calculate one day. Since the discovery, Ada has been given many posthumous awards for her work and is now widely considered the very first developer to exist. Ada once predicted, that brain of mine is something more than merely mortal, as time will show. If she was alive today, she would have known just how true those words became. Though underappreciated in her time, she is now considered a programming pioneer, and what she created will live on forever as a brilliant first step in programming. If you'd like to see more, visit us at masterycoding.com. Thanks so much for watching, and don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more content.