15 Feb
2008
15 Feb
'08
12:44 p.m.
Jules Richardson wrote:
Brent Hilpert wrote:
With a (large) digital system what's the difference? It was a concern which did
have to be addressed (with techniques like margin checking, amongst others) to
get useful production/uptime out of the machines. Refer to Will's earlier
mention of probability and statistics.
And that's the 40's, a world away from 1900 or 1910.
The idea of building such large systems was
considered daunting or simply implausible even in the 1940's
I think the issues there revolved largely around a belief that the end result
simply wouldn't work to the required spec, rather than it not being possible
to do at all. I think something electric is achievable, but I still
think that something
which was largely mechanical in nature (at least for the logic) would have
been a better bet.
You may be right, even with relays there is the issue of the reliability of
(thousands of) contacts: plating techniques and metal alloys weren't then what
they are now.