Chem, Just for the fun of it; I did my military time servicing those analog computers as I called them. They were vacuum tubes and mechanical devices. It is partly the fact because I am old and partly because the Swedish Navy was less sophisticated then the US ditto.
Best Regards , Lennart Thornros lenn...@thornros.com +1 916 436 1899 Whatever you vividly imagine, ardently desire, sincerely believe and enthusiastically act upon, must inevitably come to pass. (PJM) On Thu, Apr 14, 2016 at 1:23 PM, ChemE Stewart <cheme...@gmail.com> wrote: > Just keeping Jed honest: > > First calculator: 2000 BC Inventor: Sumerians > > > http://www.thecalculatorsite.com/articles/units/history-of-the-calculator.php > > First Electronic Calculator: > > The story of the electronic calculator really begins in the late 1930s as > the world began to prepare for renewed war. To calculate the trigonometry > required to drop bombs ‘into a pickle barrel’ from 30,000 feet, to hit a > 30-knot Japanese warship with a torpedo or to bring down a diving Stuka > with an anti aircraft gun required constantly updated automated solutions. > These > were provided respectively by the Sperry-Norden bombsight, the US Navy’s > Torpedo Data Computer and the Kerrison Predictor AA fire control system. > > All were basically mechanical devices using geared wheels and rotating > cylinders, but producing electrical outputs that could be linked to weapon > systems. During the Second World War, the challenges of code-breaking > produced the first all-electronic computer, *Colossus*. But this was a > specialised machine that basically performed “exclusive or” (XOR) Boolean > algorithms. > :) > > On Thu, Apr 14, 2016 at 4:12 PM, Jed Rothwell <jedrothw...@gmail.com> > wrote: > >> Lennart Thornros <lenn...@thornros.com> wrote: >> >> >>> There is theory called the S-curve theory. Many examples from the vacuum >>> tube / transistor evolution and calculators mechanic / solid state. Plenty >>> of big companies went belly up as they did not react fast enough. >>> >> >> So did many small companies. >> >> >> >>> This is why large corporations are a bad thing. They have no flexibility >>> . . . >>> >> >> The transistor was invented at AT&T, and the calculator at HP and TI. >> Those were large corporations. Your own examples show that sometimes big >> corporations are good thing, and they sometimes have flexibility. >> >> Small companies often lack flexibility. >> >> - Jed >> >> >
