Datos demogrÃ¡ficos de American Samoa

The counting frame is a abacus (tool being used to calculate) made of a rectangular framework provided with stems on which slide of the balls.

The counting frame is related to the system of decimal numeration : each ball represents, according to the stem on which it is, a unit, ten, a hundred… Certain counting frames comprise special balls being worth 5 units, 5 tens, 5 hundreds…

The counting frames make it possible to carry out the calculation of the elementary operations: Addition S, Subtraction S, Multiplication S, Division S. In expert hands, it is however possible to carry out other operations of the calculations type of énièmes roots or conversion into various bases.

One distinguishes several types

from them the counting frame Chinese or suan side . It has been used in China for more than 8 centuries. One finds an illustration of it on a work dating from the 12th century. On each stem, one finds 5 balls representing a unit and 2 balls representing 5 units, separated by a central bar.
the counting frame Japanese or soroban . It appears with the Japan about the 14th probably imported century of China. It gradually lost, compared to the Chinese counting frame, two balls (a ball of value 1 and one ball of value 5).
the Russian counting frame or stchoty (Счёты) , also used in certain Iranian regions under the name of choreb and in Turkey under the name of coulba is made of stems carrying 10 balls of value 1
the counting frame-meter French used in the French schools until the 18th century, alternative probable of the Russian instrument.

It is surprising to notice, at the era of the electronic Calculatrice, the great importance which this instrument of calculation in all preserves the Asia. It is not rare to see Russian or Asian tradesmen carrying out a calculation using a computer and checking the result using the counting frame of it. In expert hands, this one is with a frightening effectiveness. In 1945, a match opposing a Japanese accountant provided with a soroban and an electric operator of computer (Matsuzaki against Woods) was gained by the soroban by a score from 4 to 1.

Reading of a number

Each column represents on the basis of the line, the units, tens, hundreds etc the 5 balls in lower part of the bar are worth each one 1 and the 2 balls located above the bar are worth each one 5.

Example:

Here one can read the 6 number; 302 715 408 by counting the value represented by the balls in each columns.

External bond

various procedures, page presenting the methods of calculating for the elementary operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division) like for the extraction of the roots square and cubic.
to initiate itself with the counting frame

Be-X-old: Абак Simple: Abacus Zh-classical: 算盤 Zh-yue: 算盤

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