[NJARC] PC 1, Collosus 0

[Ray Chase]

The Collosus was a late addition to the WWII code breaking effort at Blechley Park, most of the real work was done by electromechanical machines called bombes as well as by traffic analysis, the breaking of German lower level codes and just plain good brain work often done by recruited expert crossword puzzle solvers.  The bombe machine, originally developed by some Polish code breakers did the bulk of the work, a US version is on display at the Intelligence museum in MD (forgot the name of the base).  Notice that they refer to a Lorenz code machine, most German codes were generated on the Enigma code machine of what much has been written.  Maybe Lorenz made Enigma machines.  Anyway, maybe the Brits didn't have the benefit of the latest technology but how they organized teams of people to break the German codes is a fascinating story of WWII.
BTW, Evan of the MARCH group at InfoAge (MidAtlanticRetroComputerHobbyists) has been doing some research on the Eniac and the two guys who created it.  While it is common knowledge that Eniac was used to create ballistic tables for artillery trajectories, he has just found information that a more important reason to get it created was initiated at Camp Evans by thier requirement to develop radiation and side lobe patterns that would result from truncated and distorted parabola antennas needed for their fledging radar systems.  This is newly discovered history (we believe) and more information will be forthcoming.
Ray