11–20 of 36 posts
will wear and tear of the mechanical parts affect accuracy?
Sure, just like a sloppy slide-rule or mechanical calipers or micrometer will give you iffy readings. Whether the accuracy change is a material one depends on what you are doing. Daisy chaining results would get you into meaningless territory quite fast I would imagine.
will wear and tear of the mechanical parts affect accuracy?
Sure, just like a sloppy slide-rule or mechanical calipers or micrometer will give you iffy readings. Whether the accuracy change is a material one depends on what you are doing. Daisy chaining results would get you into meaningless territory quite fast I would imagine.
Is that an A4 at the end? :)
I love the tone of amazement and excitement in the video. The images were amazing, but the tone really stuck with me. I wonder what could be done to bring back that type of mass amazement and excitement towards technology? When I think of the future I'm blown away by the possibilities of CRISPER, 3d printing, energy storage, block chains, driver-less cars, UBI, space exploration and more. We are advancing so quickly…
The US in the 50's and early 60's was definitely optimistic - everything is getting better soon because
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140924171143-103827-zero-to...
Loved the V2 rocket launch at the end. Back in '48 we didn't have any rockets, but we did have Wernher Von Braun.
"'Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down? That's not my department,' says Wernher von Braun."
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure, just like a sloppy slide-rule or mechanical calipers or micrometer will give you iffy readings. Whether the accuracy change is a material one depends on what you are doing. Daisy chaining results would get you into meaningless territory quite fast I would imagine.
Not unlike the way floating point rounding errors accumulate, in fact. The only difference is you can mitigate those to a degree by increasing the digits of precision, whereas that can't really be done on a mechanical computer.
Also, if you're into this sort of thing here's the first in a seven video series on a very different mechanical computer - Albert Michelson's Harmonic Analyzer which does Fourier Analysis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAsM30MAHLg
The narration is too much. That UCLA differential analyzer from 1947 was the peak of that technology. Earlier ones in the US go back to 1928. Wikipedia says UCLA had three of those. Probably for the Southern California aircraft industry. That was near the end of the line for the pure mechanical analog computers. Even the gun and missile guidance systems had electrical inputs and outputs. 1947 was late to be building…
I prefer "Los-an-ju-leez," as that was a common style among radio announcers. But all three are officially correct, according to an LA Times article I read years ago.