arithmometer

Also known as arithmomètre, arithmometre

thumb|upright=1.3|Arithmomètre built by Louis Payen around 1887

~20 min read

Encyclopedic overview

30 sections

Contents

Evolution
Searching for a solution: 1820–1851
Creating an {{nowrap|industry: 1851–1887}}
The golden age: 1887–1915
Legacy
History
Design
First machine
Production
Ease of use and speed
Models
Prices
Development costs
Physical design
Input – control – execution
Output – accumulator
Arithmometer's Leibniz wheel
Operations
Sliding the top carriage
Resetting the displays
Addition
Multiplication
Subtraction
Integer division
Decimal division
Variants
See also
Notes
References
External links

thumb|upright=1.3|Arithmomètre built by Louis Payen around 1887

The arithmometer () was the first digital mechanical calculator strong and reliable enough to be used daily in an office environment. This calculator could add and subtract two numbers directly and perform long multiplications and divisions effectively by using a movable accumulator for the result.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “arithmometer” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.