Every second Tuesday of October is the International Day of Ada Lovelace, who is considered the first computer programmer in history.

Augusta Ada Byron, Countess of Lovelace (1815 – 1852) was an English mathematician and writer. Her social position, as a high society woman and her intellectual environment, led her to associate with well-known personalities like Charles Babbage, who is known as “the father of computers”, the inventor of the mechanical general-purpose computer, the Analytical Engine.

She was the first to recognize that the machine had applications beyond pure calculation. When she was 28, she translated an article from an Italian military engineer, Luigi Menabrea, adding her own comments, what she called Notes. These notes contain what we currently know as the first algorithm intended to be carried out by such a machine. 

Lovelace is often referred to as the first computer programmer, but some biographers, computer scientists, and historians of computing claim otherwise, being more controversial about her contributions.

Despite her contributions to the scientific world, her recognition didn’t happen until the 80s, when the US Department of Defense created a computer language that they called Ada, and the Associaton for Women in Computing inaugurated its Ada Lovelace Awards.

Since Ada wrote the first algorithm until nowadays, education in Science, Computers, and Mathematics has left to be a privilege for men. However, there is still a gender breach in these disciplines, and that’s the reason why Suw Charman-Anderson, the founder of the International Day of Ada Lovelace, create this day to fight against the invisibility of women in the world of technology.