punched tape

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English

WOTD – 28 September 2024

Etymology

A roll of punched tape.
A 1950s Harwell Dekatron computer which used punched tape.[n 1]

From punched (adjective) +‎ tape.[1]

Pronunciation

Noun

punched tape (usually uncountable, plural punched tapes)

  1. (computing, historical) Synonym of paper tape (“an early sequential digital storage medium originally used with teletype machines, consisting of a long roll of paper, each character being encoded as a pattern of punched holes”)
    Synonym: punched paper tape
    Coordinate terms: punch card, punched card
    • 1960 December, “Talking of Trains: Recording Electric Operation”, in Trains Illustrated, London: Ian Allan Publishing, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 707:
      Train positions and speeds were established by a track magnet at each milepost, which produced a suitable mark on the punched recording tape whenever a train passed.

Translations

Notes

  1. ^ From the collection of The National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park, Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England, in the United Kingdom.

References

  1. ^ “punched tape, n.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, July 2023; “punched tape, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

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