For instance, I have a programmable watering system for outside. It has knobs for frequency and duration. Is it really computing anything, or is it full of non-computing electronics?
In: Engineering
If we go back 30 years ago, simple devices like your watering controller would not be computing devices. Those electronics would be made up of logic (AND, OR, XOR and Flip Flops) or analog devices. These can be used for very specific IF this THEN that type operations (IF a rain sensor detects rain THEN turn off the sprinklers). There might be also basic math done by analog or logic. Basic settings (time) might be stored. But it would be limited to the very specific tasks that a sprinkler controller needs to do.
A computer is much more flexible. If can perform basically any type of data manipulation. Much more complex tasks can be done. More things can be “remembered”. It’s program and behavior can be changed after the computer has been manufactured with a software update. That can’t be done with a non-computing electronic device.
Fast forward to today, “computer chips” have become so small and so cheap, that they are in virtually every electronic device. Rather than designing a complex circuit consisting of dozens of logic devices, it’s cheaper to just use tiny computer chip (or die embedded in a larger chip) and write software to do the logic operations required. That wasn’t always the case, but it is now.
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