The code-breaking computer from World War II, dubbed Colossus Mk2, has been reconstructed:
Colossus Mk2 has been painstakingly put back together over a decade by computer conservationists for Bletchley museums.
As part of D-Day celebrations, 30 war coders gathered to see it once more.
Besides its code-breaking prowess, Colossus was one of the most significant forerunners of computing technology because it was programmable and electronic.
… The machines worked by reading teleprinter characters of the intercepted, encrypted message from a paper tape. The tape was looped with punched holes at the beginning and end of the text.
Usually, the cipher text had been transmitted by radio.
By current computing standards it was fast, according to Mr Sale.
He argues that the original Colossus was so powerful, it would take current computers the same amount of time to break codes.
