Pioneering computer women go live on the Internet

Two of the most influential minds in computing will discuss their roles in the history of computer programming in a live Internet interview from Temple Bar Studios in Dublin on Sunday. Ms Kay McNulty Mauchly Antonnelli and Ms Jean Bartik, will be broadcasting on www.ohkaycomputer.com as part of a documentary, "Oh Kay Computer", for both terrestrial and Internet broadcast. It will be the culmination of a series of lectures they delivered in Irish universities this week.

Ms McNulty Mauchly Antonnelli and Ms Bartik worked during and after the second World War on ENIAC, the world's first electronic computer. Both women were recruited into the war effort to work at the Moore School of Engineering in the University of Pennsylvania. In the autumn of 1945 they were among six women chosen to program ENIAC.

Owing to secrecy, the women initially had to program the computer from blueprints in an adjacent room. Once they had devised the program on paper, the women were allowed into the ENIAC room to physically program it and their work paid off. Using their program ENIAC could add 5,000 numbers or do 14 10-digit multiplications in a second. ENIAC laid the foundations for the subsequent computing and information processing industry since the second World War.

In recent years both women have been recognised as computing pioneers and have spoken widely at universities on the east coast of the US. This is their first lecture tour outside the US. The webcast, which is a joint venture between Monkeyhouse Film and 44k.com, will take place at 6 p.m. GMT on Sunday.