Not a troll question

literally switches. turns on/off values.

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Early computers interpreted binary instructions encoded on to punch cards; and rather than referring to each possible instruction by its number, you come up mnemonics like "ADD" to describe what each operation does.

Write a list of instructions one after the other and you basically have assembly language, except you are translating it by hand in to numbered instructions encoded on a punch cart.

Writing a computer program to convert textual mnemonics in to the corresponding instruction codes, by first punching out the interpreter code by hand, is trivial.

If the idea of a machine which can manipulate its state in different ways based on a particular combination of switches being toggled on/off eludes you, study more fundamentals first.

First computers were made by god and they were running templeos you brainlets
Do you think they can just be made?
How were people supposed to program them without a computer?
Thats what i thought

You better pray and start going to church or pc will catch fire and die

I think an underappreciated part to the history behind question is how much of firmware/software architecture and abstraction was already worked out by the time the first pieces of software were actually implemented.

Here's a better question. Before the transistor, we had mechanical computers that used no electricity, only physical force. How were these computers programmed?

(Sidenote: the germans invented these mechanical computers based off old ideas from roman times (ideas which probably dated back to at least ancient egypt) but these mechanical computers were destroyed in the world wars. Calculate how much further advanced humans would be if jews stopped killing "goyim")

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Imagine being this uneducated swine.

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Nigger, almost every component visible on this pic is electromechanical. I feel like I'm being baited, but I'm still going to reply like a retard.

remember white people made all of that.

Punch cards.
They were used in textile machines for making patterns on carpets.
Then someone found out you can use them on typewriters and then whole industry kicked off.

No, I'm pretty sure there were some Jews in there too. Unless you consider them white of course...

Basically this. Things started out incredibly manual and labour intensive and more and more things slowly became automated (a program was written using 0's and 1's to translate programs written in keywords into 0's and 1's. Then someone wrote a program using keywords and translate programs written in C into keywords. Then someone...etc.)

It seems like an impossible task at first, that's why they call turning a computer on "booting". It comes from "pulling yourself up by your bootstraps" a phrase used to reference an impossible task.

I worked on a 16-bit machine that needed the boot loader keyed in via toggle switches (set 16 switches to 1 or 0 for around 32 words (IIRC)), don't fuck it up, hit run and the system bootstraps off a 14" hard drive.

There were few enough transistors that you could just set the on / off state of each one.

Charles Babbage drew up designs for a mechanical computer in the mid-19th century. Unfortunately it was never completed, but the design was proven to work later on.

During that same time, computers were people employed to carry out equations, keep records and such.

There were also mechanical machines that could count and sort items, but they couldn't perform an wide / infinite number of instructions like a computer.

The us navy still use many mechanical computers aboard destroyers to calculate cannon targeting.

Those hydrolic powered targeting systems are faster than modern computers.
google.com/url?q=http://web.mit.edu/STS.035/www/PDFs/Newell.pdf&sa=U&ved=2ahUKEwjMm4ONzs3iAhVFd6wKHT4sBmYQFjAFegQIAhAB&usg=AOvVaw34fGwwJUS45zfGCJCK-WQS

They weren't "programmed" per se, all of their behavior was determined by the design of their physical components and affected by the user's inputs. Closest thing to programming like with digital systems was swapping out gears for ones with different numbers of teeth. Look up mechanical calculators, the Antikythera Mechanism, Enigma encoders, and Albert Michelson's Harmonic Analyzer. Relevant channels include engineerguy and Numberphile.

>take electric switch
>add battery
>open switch
>close it
>repeat the last two steps a few times

congrats you started coding.
The entire history of computer science is one of putting another layer of abstraction on top of the current performance singularity.
From the invention of controllable electricity to your js-barista-framework is one of putting another layer on top.
It's really shit as far as science goes

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>before coding
>goes on to explain coding cards
you Jow Forumsees aren't the smartest bees, eh..

Look up bootstrapping. Pretty mindblowing stuff, but works in practice.

now you cant do it? How many transistors there are in modern computers?

Each transistor on an i7 8700 is 14nm "long/wide/whatever", so take a guess.

youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8dPuuaLjXtNlUrzyH5r6jN9ulIgZBpdo

This.

The average processor has several independent processors inside it. In fact, an average desktop processor is a full blown computer in itself.

Stuff like that is no longer taught in normal public schools. They will teach you how to use a computer in kindergarten though.