The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage

You only wish Computer Science was this cool.

In Real Life, Charles Babbage was an eccentric genius who designed the world's first computers while Ada, Countess of Lovelace, was a mathematician who wrote the first computer programs before any computers were actually built. Sadly, Babbage's computers were never built and Lovelace died when she was 36.

As it turns out, Real Life sucks, so what actually happened was that Babbage and Lovelace built a Difference Engine that takes up an entire building and use it to fight crime. That is, if you define crime as street music and poetry.

The comic (found at 2dgoggles.com) is written by Sydney Padua, who wrote the first installment in celebration of Ada Lovelace Day.

Tropes used in The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage include:

Brunel: I'd be able to build gigantic iron ships, certainly–but could they FLY?
Ada: It would indeed be difficult...
Brunel: Would Darwin be able to mess around with his..uh, barnacles he won't talk about?
Ada: Um, that one I'm not sure about...
Brunel: WOULD FARADAY BE ABLE TO DO THAT WHATSIS WITH THE THINGAMAJIG?
Ada: NO! NO HE WOULD NOT!

Ada: I surmise it contains a small difference engine to analyze the acoustic wave patterns...
Babbage: Exactly! It's operated by a crank!
Ada: Indeed.

  • Stealth Pun: The Coniform Collector of Tympanic Violations.
  • Steampunk: The Difference Engine is a giant clockwork. Their economy modeler runs on steam. Babbage's Harmonic Disruptor operates on punch cards. And on and on ...
    • The alternate history suggests that with the aid of the Difference Engine England is able to defeat the Martian horde...
  • Suckiness Is Painful: The Organist.
  • This Is Your Brain on Evil: Ada has diagrams to show Your Brain on Poetry.
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