The enigma machine did not use cams; they were rotating switches.
The enigma machine consisted of a number of wheels (starting at four wheels, but the number increased as the war went on to add complexity to the hash), a mechanical keyboard with electric contacts on the keys, a patch panel with a number of jacks and jumper cables somewhat like an old telephone switchboard, and an output of lamps with letters and numbers on them. There were also books and tables involved. Each wheel was about two inches in diameter and a half-inch thick. Each had a set of characters on the outside of the circumference and electrical contacts elsewhere for each character, both input and output contacts. Each wheel had a different name because each different wheel's input points were wired differently to each output point. The keyboard's electrical output went to the first wheel's input contacts, then through every wheel and out one of the last wheel's output points to a character lamp on the top of the unit. The patch panel was also in the path somewhere. The electrical path through the stack of wheels was determined by the position and internal wiring of each wheel. In addition the wheels rotated somewhat like an odometer each time a keyboard key was pressed. To encode, the machine was set up with the proper wheels in the proper positions, set to the proper start points, and the jumpers in the patch panel set to the proper positions. When each keyboard key was pressed (to encode each character of each five-letter group) an electrical path was made from the keyboard key, through each individual wheel, through the jumper panel and to a character lamp which was the encoded output. Decoding used a similar technique. The machine was actually invented in Germany before the war for commercial communications to keep secrets from the competition and was later adapted and enhanced by the military. An early simpler version of the machine was used by the German Army during the invasion of Poland. These messages were interecepted by the Poles who created a copy of the enigma machine by reverse engineering from the deciphered messages. They then proceeded to build an automatic deciphering machine. Unfortunately the British mostly turned their backs on these Polish experts when some of them managed to escape to England. The submarine versions were the most complex and became more so as the war went on. I seem to recall that most later messages were sent stateside to be deciphered by early generation computers there. I also recall that the Allies did not spend enough effort on their own enciphering so the Germans also had great success deciphering Allied messages. Jan and I read the book "The Enigma Machine" to each other while on road trips several years ago so I am sure some of my details are wrong. Finally, the book claimed the first programmable electrical computers were made in England for deciphering enigma messages, but all 13 were destroyed so that these cutting edge machines would not fall into evil hands (probably the Soviets). Just think of how much more brilliant Ben would be now if one had been smuggled into Russia! Norm S/V Bandersnatch Lying Julington Creek FL N30 07.68 W081 38.4 > What you're describing with the cams on that old mechanical computer sounds > an awful lot like the WWII Enigma cypher machine the Wehrmacht used and many > movies were made highlighting the Allies successful aquisition of it. If I > remember correctly, that machine "created" codes by the movement (from a > keystroke) of a cam inside the machine. _______________________________________________ Liveaboard mailing list [email protected] To adjust your membership settings over the web http://liveaboardonline.com/mailman/listinfo/liveaboard To subscribe send an email to [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected] The archives are at http://www.liveaboardonline.com/pipermail/liveaboard/ To search the archives http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] The Mailman Users Guide can be found here http://www.gnu.org/software/mailman/mailman-member/index.html
