A British female scientist named Ada Lovelace is considered to be the first computer programmer. Born in 1815, Lovelace was educated in mathematics, science and logic from an early age. She became one of the most brilliant mathematicians of the time. lovelace interested in machines so that she met mathematician Charles Babbage in 1833. Babbage had designed a computing machine called the Difference Engine and machines called the Analytical Engine, which did more complex operations than it. Lovelace realized that the Analytical Engine could perform a number of mathematical operations and used this machine to generate Bernoulli numbers. The algorithm she wrote to calculate these numbers is considered to be the first computer program in history.
Since it was forbidden for women to participate in scientific discussions in England during his lifetime, he used only the A.A.B signature in his articles so that it would not be understood that he was a woman in his articles. With this feature, she is the first woman to publish a scientific article on computers. In Lovelace’s time, computer programming was not considered a profession. Computer programming became a profession nearly a century after Lovelace died in 1852. Today, computer programming is seen as one of the fastest growing career fields.
Ada Lovelace died on November 27, 1852, at the age of 36 from uterine cancer. Long after her death, she named the first ISO Standard object-oriented programming language developed by the US Department of Defense “Ada” in honor of Ada Lovelace.
It is not a widely heard topic that the world’s first computer programmer was a woman, maybe if this were mentioned more, the idea that women would not write code would have disappeared. The 15th day of October of each year has been declared as “Ada Lovelace Day”, the day where women’s achievements in science, technology, engineering and mathematics are celebrated all over the world.
