In 1876-1878, Baron Lord Kelvin builds his harmonic analyzer and tide predictor machines. The harmonic analyzer broke down complex harmonic, or repeating, waves into the simpler waves that made them up. The tide predictor machine could calculate the time and height of the ebb and flood tides for any day of the year.
Sources:
- Luigi M Bianchi (2003) Lecture 20: Analog vs Digital.
- Photo from Allison Marsh (2024) https://spectrum.ieee.org/tide-predictions.