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The computer historian Doron Swade, a prominent world expert on the work of Babbage, settles the controversy with new data presented at the symposium now taking place at the University of Oxford to mark the 200th anniversary of the birth of Lovelace, and reveals a sneak preview to OpenMind: āI confirm that the manuscript evidence clearly shows that Babbage wrote āprogramsā for his Analytical Engine in 1836-7 i.e. 6-7 years before the publication of Lovelaceās article in 1843. There are about 24 of such āprogramsā and they have the identical features of the Lovelaceās famous āprogramā,ā adds Swade. The historian says that the new tests are āunarguableā and that they ādo not support, indeed they contradict the claim that Lovelace was the āfirst programmerā.ā```
