| History of computing |
|---|
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| Hardware |
| Software |
| Computer science |
| Modern concepts |
| By country |
| Timeline of computing |
| Glossary of computer science |
This article presents a detailedtimeline of events in the history ofcomputing from 2000 to 2009. For narratives explaining the overall developments, see thehistory of computing.
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| January 14 | The US Government announces that restrictions on exporting cryptography are being relaxed (although not removed). This allows many US companies to stop the long running process of having to create US and international copies of their software. |
| January 19 | Transmeta releases theCrusoe microprocessor. The Crusoe was intended for laptops and consumed significantly less electricity than most microprocessors of the time, while providing comparable performance to the mid-range Pentium II microprocessors. Transmeta and Crusoe, new competitors to Intel and their products, initially appeared exciting and promising. |
| February 17 | Microsoft releasesWindows 2000.[1] |
| March | Be Inc. releasedBeOS R5 for PowerPC and x86, which was the first release ofBeOS for x86 to have a freely downloadable version which could be fully installed on a user's hard drive. |
| March 4 | Sony releases thePlayStation 2. |
| March 6 | AMD released anAthlon clocked at 1 GHz. |
| March 8 | Intel releases very limited supplies of the 1 GHz Pentium III chip. |
| June 20 | British Telecom (BT) claim the rights to hyperlinks on the basis of a US patent granted in 1989. Similar patents in the rest of the world have now expired. |
| June 29 | IBM delivers theASCI Whitesupercomputer to theU.S. Department of Energy. This supercomputer was capable of performing 12.3teraflops, making it the world's fastest at the time.[2] |
| September 6 | RSA Security released theirRSA algorithm into the public domain, in advance of the US patent (#4,405,829) expiring on September 20 of the same year. Following the relaxation of the US government restrictions earlier in the year (January 14) this removed one of the last barriers to the worldwide distribution of much software based on cryptographic systems. TheIDEA algorithm is still under patent; government restrictions still apply in some places. |
| September 14 | Microsoft releasesWindows Me.[3] |
| November | TheEricsson R380, the first phone runningSymbian OS was released.[4] |
| November 20 | Intel releases thePentium 4. The processor is built using theNetBurst microarchitecture, a new design since the introduction of the P6 microarchitecture used in the Pentium Pro in late 1995. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| January 4 | Linux kernel version 2.4.0 released. |
| January 9 | Apple introducesiTunes, a digitalmedia player application that later revolutionizeddigital music distribution.[5] |
| January 15 | Wikipedia is launched.[6][7]: 317 |
| February 1 | Foundation of the newcoLoquendo as a spin-off of theCSELT's voice technology group. |
| February | TheAgile Manifesto, which crystallised and named a growing trend towards more "agile" processes in software development, was released. The perceived success of agile project management led to agile approaches such asScrum later being used as a general project management approach in other fields, not just in software development or even in computing. |
| March 24 | Apple releasedmacOS (as Mac OS X). This was a new operating system derived fromNeXTSTEP, usingDarwin as itskernel, an Open Source operating system based on BSD. This replaced the"classic" Mac OS for its Mac computers. Mac OS X finally gave Mac users the stability benefits of a protected memory architecture along many other enhancements, such as pre-emptive multitasking. The BSD base also makes portingUnix applications to Mac OS X easier and gives Mac users a full-featuredcommand line interface alongside their GUI. |
| September 14 | Nintendo releases theirsixth generation home console, theGameCube. |
| October 25 | Microsoft releasedWindows XP, based onWindows 2000 andWindows NTkernel. Windows XP introduces a heavily redesigned GUI and brings the NT kernel to the consumer market. |
| November 15 | Microsoft releases theXbox in North America. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| March 4 | RIM (now BlackBerry Ltd) released the firstBlackBerry smartphone. |
| April 24 | Microsoft releasesWindows Server 2003, anoperating system designed forserver management andenterprise-level applications. |
| May 30 | United Linux officially formed. |
| September 7 | Blender, a 3D graphics software package, becomesopen-source software after acrowdfunding campaign successfully raises €100,000. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| February | Nvidia releasesGeForce FX, a family ofDirectX 9.0-compatible 3D cards with extensive support for pixel and vertex shaders. With this new product Nvidia makes an emphasis on image quality, proclaiming a "dawn of cinematic computing", illustrated with the popular Dawn demo utilising extremely realistic skin and wing shaders. |
| March 6 | SCO Group announces it would sue IBM for US$1 billion. The claim is that Linux contains code inserted by IBM that was the copyrighted property of SCO (seeSCO v. IBM). |
| March 12 | Intel releases thePentium M for notebooks and theCentrino mobile platform. The Pentium M delivers similar or higher performance than the Pentium 4-M while consuming less power. |
| April 22 | AMD releases theOpteron line of server processors. The Opteron is the successor of theAthlon MP, and introduces the64-bitK8 microarchitecture. |
| September 23 | AMD releases theAthlon 64. The Athlon 64 is built on the K8 microarchitecture and is the first 64-bit processor widely available to the consumer market. |
| December 17 | Linux kernel version 2.6.0 is released. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| April | Sony releasedLibrié EBR-1000EP in Japan, the first e-book reader with anelectronic paper display.[8] |
| April 1 | Google announcesGmail.[9] |
| April 14 | Nvidia releasesGeForce 6800, marking the biggest leap in graphics technology for the company. Independent reviews report more than 100% increase in productivity compared to the fastest card on the market. Continuing the tradition, the company demonstrates Nalu, amermaid with extremely realistic hair. A few weeks later, rivalATI announces theX800 series with nearly the same level of performance and feature support. The card is showcased by the Ruby demo, delivering a smoothreal-time rendering of what was previously in the exclusive realm of prerendered cinematics.[10] |
| October 20 | The first release of theUbuntu Linux distribution.[11] |
| Infineon Technologies pleads guilty to charges ofDRAM price fixing, resulting in a $160 million fine.Hynix Semiconductor,Samsung andElpida would later plead guilty to the same.[12] | |
| November 9 | Firefox 1.0 released, which later becameMicrosoftInternet Explorer's biggest competitor sinceNetscape Navigator. |
| November 21 | Nintendo releases theNintendo DS, introducing dual screens andtouchscreen technology tohandheld gaming.[13] |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| February 26 | Jef Raskin, who in 1979 envisioned and established theMacintosh project atApple Computer, dies at the age of 61. |
| April 29 | Apple Computer releasesMac OS X Tiger (v10.4) for PowerPC-based Macs. |
| May 25 | Nokia announces theNokia 770 Internet Tablet, the first device runningMaemo. |
| May 26 | Intel releases thePentium D, their first dual-core 64-bit desktop processor. |
| May 31 | AMD releases theAthlon 64 X2, their first dual-core 64-bit desktop processor. |
| June 6 | Apple announces they are going to useIntel processors in upcoming Macintosh computers.[14] |
| July 22 | Microsoft announces their next consumer operating system,Windows Vista (previously "Longhorn"), to be released in early 2007. |
| November 22 | Microsoft releases theXbox 360.[15] |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| January 5 | Intel releases theCore brand. These are mobile 32-bit single-core and dual-core processors that were built using a modified design of thePentium M's microarchitecture. |
| January 10 | Apple Computer introduces theMacBook Pro, their first Intel-based, dual-core mobile computer, as well as an Intel-basediMac. |
| June 19 | Researchers create experimental processor that operates at higher than 500 GHz when cryogenically frozen.[16][17] |
| July 15 | Twitter is launched, introducing a new platform formicroblogging andsocial interaction.[18] |
| July 27 | Intel releases theCore 2 processor. |
| September 26 | Intel announces plans for an 80-core processor that would exceed 1 TFLOP, planned to be available in 2011.[19] |
| October 9 | Google announcesacquisition ofYouTube in $1.65billion deal, recognizing the growing importance ofvideo content on the internet.[20] |
| November 11 | Sony releases thePlayStation 3. |
| November 19 | Nintendo releases theWii. |
| December 24 | AmigaOS 4 was released by Hyperion Entertainment (VOF) under license from Amiga, Inc. forAmigaOne registered users. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| January 7 | The firstiPhone was introduced by Apple. |
| January 30 | Microsoft Corporation launchesWindows Vista more than 5 years after their last major, newoperating system,Windows XP, was released. |
| June 5 | Asus announces the firstAsus Eee PC, launching thenetbook category of mobile computers.[21] It initially ran Linux; later models also offered a choice of Windows. |
| October 26 | Apple launchesMac OS X Leopard (v10.5) |
| November 19 | AMD releases thePhenom line of high performance processors, positioning the Athlon as a mid-range line. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| February 19 | Blu-ray wins thehigh definitionoptical disc format war againstHD DVD, becoming the industry standard for high-definition media.[22][23] |
| September 2 | The first public beta version of theGoogle Chrome web browser was released. Chrome subsequently became the most popular web browser in the world, overtaking Internet Explorer. |
| September 23 | The first version ofAndroid was introduced byGoogle.[24] |
| October 22 | TheHTC Dream (T-Mobile G1), the first commercially available device to run the Android operating system, was released. |
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| January 3 | The online currencyBitcoin is released.[25] |
| May | Facebook overtakesMySpace in America.[26] |
| August 28 | Apple launchesMacOS X Snow Leopard (v10.6) |
| September 1 | Sony releases thePS3 Slim. |
| October 22 | Microsoft releasesWindows 7.[27] |
