English in computing

The English language is sometimes described as the lingua franca of computing. In comparison to other sciences, where Latin and Greek are often the principal sources of vocabulary, computer science borrows more extensively from English. In the past, due to the technical limitations of early computers, and the lack of international standardization on the Internet, computer users were limited to using English and the Latin alphabet. However, this historical limitation is less present today, due to innovations in internet infrastructure and increases in computer speed. Most software products are localized in numerous languages and the invention of the Unicode character encoding has resolved problems with non-Latin alphabets. Some limitations have only been changed recently, such as with domain names, which previously allowed only ASCII characters. English is seen as having this role due to the prominence of the United States and the United Kingdom, both English-speaking countries, in the development and popularization of computer systems, computer networks, software and information technology. Computer Science has an ultimately mathematical foundation which was laid by non-English speaking cultures. The first mathematically literate societies in the Ancient Near East recorded methods for solving mathematical problems in steps, The word 'algorithm' comes from the name of a famous medieval Arabic mathematician who contributed to the spread of Hindu-Arabic numerals, al-Khwārizmī, and the first systematic treatment of binary numbers was completed by Leibniz, a German mathematician. Leibniz wrote his treatise on the topic in French, the lingua franca of science at the time, and innovations in what is now called Computer hardware occurred outside of an English tradition, with Pascal inventing the first mechanical calculator, and Leibniz improving it. Interest in building computing machines first emerged in the 19th century, with the coming of the Second Industrial Revolution.