The reason why we chose "Culture" instead of "Feiyu" is because the project team has spent a lot of time on Curta and accumulated some experience. Compared with the keyboard-style "Feiyu", it seems easier to imitate "Culture"
Some.
The main components of the lever-type hand-operated computer include the left and right digital disks, the main drive, the carry device, the stepping drum, the counter, the shifter, the counter, etc. The manufacturing difficulty still lies in the carry device, the counter, and the shifter.
In terms of the material strength of other mechanisms, sometimes it is the lever, teeth, and tooth plates that are excessively worn, sometimes it is the torsion spring and the compression spring plate that are not elastic enough, and sometimes it is the eleventh gear tolerance that is too large, resulting in problems such as the number of strings, the number of belts, and the half number.
.The lifespan of individual components is only about 10,000 times. The only solution is to frequently oil and replace parts.
Fortunately, the size and weight are smaller than the enlarged version of Curta, and the lifespan is longer. After all, the mechanical structure is simpler. Although it is not so exquisite, it is simple and durable. Several samples have been made at the moment, but they are still in use.
Under repeated testing and improvement.
Most of the veterans actually brought enough calculators, and the manpower team in the computing center rarely used hand-cranked computers for calculation tasks. Originally, the demand for this thing was not very urgent. The relevant design, manufacturing, and testing personnel, including the veterans, were
Other projects are frequently seconded, and the overall efficiency of the project is not high.
However, this project has received explicit or covert support from the steampunk group with Du Gong as its spiritual leader, so it has been in a state of "research and development" and is a well-known fishing project in the machinery industry.
However, with the expansion of the occupied area, especially the future occupied area will be expanded to Guangdong and Guangxi, the local government can no longer continue the "central all-inclusive" system in Hainan, Taiwan and other places. All kinds of finance, taxation, and statistics are controlled by the Government Affairs Council.
A team was sent to complete it. Regardless of whether it is Hainan, Taiwan or Jeju, the economic scale and population weight are relatively low, and the number of calculations is not large. Basic statistics and analysis can be completed with a very small number of modern equipment.
But now, starting from Guangzhou Special City, all regions have to establish their own fiscal and taxation and statistical agencies, and the demand for computing has suddenly increased. As a result, the hand-cranked computer project has suddenly accelerated.
Feng Nuo once visited a replica project of a hand-cranked computer. He had to admit that it was really difficult for him to make any contribution to the project - basically anyone who didn't know how to do benchwork would be of no use. Feng Shan would occasionally take students there.
The Manpower Computing Center visits the few "miracles of Senate wisdom" and regularly provides practical lessons on hand-cranked computers to students in the computing training classes of vocational and technical schools.
It seemed that he had to work on other aspects. Feng Nuo carefully thought about where his professional advantages were. He opened his notebook and began to browse old posts. After a while, the words "punch card" appeared in the corner of the article.
, Feng Nuo's eyes lit up, and he vaguely felt that he had grasped a breakthrough.
Next, he consulted a lot of information, looked through past "Nature and Science", and gradually had a preliminary plan in mind.
Before the soldiers and horses were moved, food and fodder went first. After being in the Senate for so long, Feng Nuo still knew the basics of preparing public opinion in advance. He spent several nights, scissors, paste and original creation, and concocted it.
Two articles. One "From the 1890 U.S. Census to the Rise of IBM—A Brief Discussion on the Historical Contribution of Mechanical Computers" and one "The Three Basic Equipment of "Analytical Computers" and the Origin of General Computer Architecture"
.
The previous article naturally talked about the glorious history of mechanical computers, but the focus was on elevating the status of punched card computer systems and at the same time stepping on hand-crank computers.
"...There is no doubt that compared to manual processing of information, the combination of cards + mechanical processors is much more advanced, and its advantages in number calculations are very obvious. As for complex tasks such as file classification and processing, mechanical computers can kill the most diligent people in an instant
Administrator. In 1890, when computers first showed their power, the U.S. census information was finally summarized and processed by a punch card program-controlled computer originated from Babbage, and the entire task was completed in six weeks. For comparison,
The previous 1880 census took seven years to process all the data, resulting in the final data being completely outdated. This victory marked the advent of the computer age. With the invention of the internal combustion engine, the electric motor and the advancement of the mechanical industry, mechanical
Computers will also cover more areas.
"By the mid-20th century, IBM, founded in 1911, was already producing thousands of mechanical computers per year to process billions of card information. Strengthened by relays, precision hydraulic parts were used to form a new generation of computing units.
Computers are also about to come on the market, capable of performing hundreds of basic operations per second...
First of all, you should quote the quotations of the supervisor to support yourself. Of course, this will be saved later if the mechanical computer is quickly surpassed by ENIAC.
Next, Fonnuo cited several examples of commercial tabulating machines being used by the U.S. government and enterprises, and finally mentioned:
"In our era, computer applications can be roughly divided into eight fields, scientific computing and data processing, industrial control and real-time control, office automation and management information systems, computer-aided design/manufacturing (CAD/CAM), Internet and communications
, multimedia, virtual reality, artificial intelligence. Among them, the first three application fields of computers have been widely recognized in governments, enterprises and academic institutions in the mechanical age."
"The origin of computers is of course for fast and effective calculations, but scientific calculations, even in the age of mechanical computers, are only part of the applications of computers. What really makes computers flourish and become widely known is their application in data processing, industrial control and office work.
Important applications in automation. This is something the Senate must carefully consider in its planning for the computer industry.
“The reason for this is that compared to business applications such as data processing, scientific computing is not so much about the processing method, but rather the amount of data to be processed and the operations to be performed on the data.
The difference between quantities.
"When computers are used in research fields such as aerospace, mechanics, meteorology, and nuclear physics, they only use a relatively small amount of data. However, in order to obtain answers, thousands of operations need to be performed on these data. Relatively small amounts of data
and a large number of operations, which are typical scientific calculations.
"Relatively, in commercial, industrial and social applications, we often have a large amount of data, but only need to perform a relatively small number of operations, such as census and statistics, such as salary calculation and payment, which are typical business properties.
data processing.
"As for simple logarithmic or trigonometric function operations, the slide rule is still a better choice."
"Scientific computing may be able to solve more difficult problems, but business data processing can solve more problems. This is the difference between Matlab and Excel. A few sets of Matlab are enough, and our existing equipment can still be used for dozens of times."
years; while the demand for Excel is insatiable, we cannot divide the data processing power of a personal laptop into thousands of parts. It is self-evident which one is more urgent."
This metaphor is not bad. I think most of the elders can understand it. Feng Nuo was quite satisfied. He then wrote unceremoniously:
"Obviously, mechanical computers not only completed a large number of computing tasks for science and engineering before the 1970s, but more importantly, they effectively supported the progress of society and industry and commerce in business processing, office automation, etc., and were the mainstay of large and very large enterprises.
A necessary prerequisite for prosperity and development. 'Stored programs', 'command controllers', 'input and output', 'data representation', 'data carriers', 'logical operations', etc. that appear in data statistics and analysis, industrial control and other applications
Demand is the key concept that ultimately forms the universal computer architecture and is the source of modern computers. Hand-cranked or electric mechanical calculators are just the prototype of computing components in this huge set of architecture."
"In the end, it was IBM, rather than any ingenious hand-cranked calculator manufacturer, that emerged as a giant in the computer manufacturing industry. This is undoubtedly the best footnote to this conclusion."
Naturally, this article is going to be submitted to "Weekly Updates".
The second article is intended to be submitted to "Nature and Science", focusing on the various components of the punch card computer system. First, it must echo the article in "Weekly Updates", and second, it must show its technical ability and professional background.
, and thirdly, it also implies that the mechanical design and manufacturing difficulty of punched card computers is actually less than that of hand-cranked calculators.
"A complete set of machines and equipment used to calculate large amounts of data, formerly known as 'analytical computers', is widely used in government departments and large enterprises and institutions that have data statistics and repetitive business processing needs. The most obvious sign is the use of punched cards (
Punched Card) as the carrier of data. Each set of 'Punched Card Computers' includes several machines with different uses. From the perspective of their functions, they can be divided into three major categories: The first category is really used for grouping, summarizing and calculating.
Machines, generally called basic machines or main machines, such as sorting machines and tabulating machines (accounting machines); Category 2 are machines that prepare for all grouping, summarizing, calculating and printing work, generally called auxiliary machines
Or auxiliary machines, including drilling machines (drilling machines), hole inspection machines, etc.; Category 3 is also auxiliary machines, but they are designed for certain specialized businesses and are only used to complete the machine assembly process
Specific additional operations are called special performance equipment, including copying machines, card selectors, decoding machines, etc."
"Punched card computers rely on mechanical design and transmission as a program, and rely on mechanical mechanisms and punched cards to temporarily store or permanently store information. Depending on the format of punched cards, they are also divided into different models. Although most of the later punched card computers used
Electromagnetic power and control mechanism, but in essence it is still an out-and-out mechanical computer, or "electromechanical computer". It can not only be designed as a fully mechanical structure, but can also be operated by human power, animal power and even steam engines.