The earliest calculation tool used in China was the abacus.

About the abacus is as follows:

The abacus ( abacus) is a form of manually operated computational aid. It originated in China and was an important invention of ancient China.

Before the advent of Arabic numerals, the abacus was a widely used calculation tool in the world. Today, the abacus continues to be used in parts of Asia and the Middle East, especially in stores, where it can be purchased from those supplying Chinese and Japanese goods.

In the West, it is sometimes used to help children understand numbers, while some mathematicians like to experience what it is like to use an abacus to work out simple arithmetic problems.

Despite the age of electronic computers, one cannot look at an ancient Chinese abacus without admiring the great wisdom of our ancestors. General abacus is mostly wooden (or plastic), rectangular wooden frame arranged in a string of equal number of beads known as the file, there is a beam to the beads separated into the upper and lower parts of each bead on behalf of 5, the lower half of each bead on behalf of the 1.

Each string of beads from right to left on behalf of the decimal number of the individual, ten, hundred, thousand, ten thousand digits. Together with the software - a set of arithmetic mnemonics for finger-plucked bead rules - you can solve a variety of complex operations and even open multiple squares. The abacus is the precursor of the modern computer, a symbol of ancient Chinese computing technology.

The new shape of the abacus is a rectangle, around the wooden frame, inside the straight column, commonly known as the "file". Generally from nine to fifteen stalls, stalls across the beam, two beads on the beam, each bead for the number of five, five beads under the beam, each bead for the number of one, the operation of the positioning of the beads after dialing the calculation can be done to add, subtract, multiply and divide the algorithm.

The existing abacus shape, material varies. General abacus is mostly wooden (or plastic), abacus by the rectangular wooden frame arranged in a string of equal number of days of the abacus beads, there is a beam to the bead system is divided into the upper and lower parts of the abacus beads within the straight columns, commonly known as the "file", generally 9 files, 11 files or 13 files. Stalls across the beam, beam 2 beads, each bead for 5; beam under 5 beads, each bead for 1.