26 Nov
2007
26 Nov
'07
10:38 a.m.
On 26 Nov 2007 at 12:47, Roy J. Tellason wrote:
This stirs a vague recollection of an old mechanical
adding machine I once
had, the kind that had a big rectangular array of buttons instead of just
a "10-key" set of numbers. I have *no* idea how it stored a number in there,
though.
My recollection of this device was that a drum with cams was used to
store a message that could then be sent later. I don't recall if
this was an attempt to provide buffering for typeahead--it's very
easy for a touch typist to type faster than the old TTY machines
could send--or just a way to record a message for later sending.
Cheers,
Chuck