In the history of Enigma, the folk at Bletchley Park wanted to build a
working replica of Colossus. They thought that the cost of
manufacturing WW2-era telephone relays would be prohibitive, until they
found that BT was just converting all their exchanges to electronic
switching!
cheers,
Nigel
On 2024-07-22 22:14, dwight via cctalk wrote:
Bob Rosenbloom started to make a relay computer, using
pc boards, but found that typical dip relays talk to each other ( leaky magnetic fields )
.
Konrad Zuse made several attempts but making useful electromechanical memory was his down
fall.
As a kid, I used a handful of radioshack relays to make a sequenced electrical lock. One
had to enter four each four bit numbers to turn on the lock. Any wrong number and you had
to start over. I think that was first the first time I did a logical design. You'd set
the 4 toggle switches for the next number in sequence and then enter it.
Not a computer but then, I was just a kid.
Dwight
--
Nigel Johnson, MSc., MIEEE, MCSE VE3ID/G4AJQ/VA3MCU
Amateur Radio, the origin of the open-source concept!
Skype: TILBURY2591