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Timeline of analog computing (draft)

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Jorn Barger

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Jul 7, 2004, 1:58:44 PM7/7/04
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I've had a lot of trouble assembling this timeline, so I'm eager to
know what I've missed. You can find links for a lot of these items
at my website: http://www.robotwisdom.com/ai/timeline/0000.html

I've taken a rather broad view of what's relevant, and I've included
some items like adding machines where I just don't know what the
mechanism was, or if it made any new contribution to 'analog'
computing.

3000 BC: water clocks in China
1500 BC: earliest known sundial in Egypt
270 BC: Ctesibus's water clock
150 BC: Hipparchus' stereography (projection of 3D onto 2D)
enables development of astrolabe
65 BC: Antikythera mechanism simulates planetary motions
60 AD: Heron's school of technology in Alexandria
no-date: proportional compass estimates square roots?

800 AD: candle clock
1025: Guido's musical staff (1st 'graph')
1285: verge-and-foliot system permits mechanical clockworks
1537: Tartaglia's gunner's quadrant for aiming cannons
1540: Toriano's mandolin-playing automaton
1571: Digges' theodolite for surveying and aiming
1581: Norman's dip-circle measures declination
1584: proportional compass refined into 'sector'

1600: Vernier refines 'nonius' for precise measurement
1606-1610: Galileo manufactures 300 sectors for ballistics, etc
1617: Napier's multiplication-device "Napier's bones"
1623: Schickard's 6-digit 'Calculating Clock' 1st mechanical
calculator, used by Kepler
1630: Delamain's circular sliderule
1633: Oughtred's linear sliderule
1645: Blaise Pascal's 5-digit Pascaline (adding machine)

1656: Huygens' pendulum clock based on Mersenne's suggestion
1659: Burattini's non-decimal calculator for currency
1666: Schott's 'organum mathematicum' includes aids for music
composition as well as engineering
1666: Morland's non-decimal calculator for currency
1672: Leibnitz's multiplying machine inspired by pedometer
1678: Grillet's calculating machine
1685: Perrault's Additioneur uses much-copied low-tech slider
design

1709: Poleni's multiplier
1715: orreries named after Earl of Orrery
1727: Leupold's circular multiplier
1731: Hadley's improved astrolabe (octant, led to sextant)
1732: Desaguliers creates 'equal-area machine' to demonstrate
path of Mercury
1737: Vaucanson's mechanical flute player, duck

1757: Campbell's sextant
1759: Harrison's chronometer wins longitude-prize
1765: 1st graphs by Johann Lambert
1775: Stanhope's calculating machine
1776: Hindenberg's and Felkel's stencil method for finding
primes (less than 400,000)
1777: Stanhope's logic demonstrator
1785: Playfair's economic graphs
1787: Watts' steam engine with feedback-governor
1794: Buxton's graph paper
no-date: Watt's Soho sliderule (well-made and accurate)

1800: Southern's 'steam-engine indicator' outputs readings as
graphs
1810: gyroscope
1814: Hermann's analog integrator
1819: Blanchard lathe
1819: galvanometer
1822: Thomas de Colmar's 4-function calculator mass-produced
(improved version of Leibnitz's) sells 1500 by 1930
1840: 1st Scheutz difference engine (inspired by Babbage)
1843: Wheatstone's 'bridge' for measuring resistance
1845: turret lathe
1846: Lalanne's logarithmic graphs (anamorphisms)

1850: Mannheim's optimised classic sliderule design
1859: Wiberg's difference engine
1863: James Thomson's planimeter with ball-and-disk integrator
1869: Jevons' logical piano
1873: Lord Kelvin's tide predictor with analog integrators
1874: Odhner's calculator 1st to use much-copied pinwheel
principle (30k sold)

1876: Lord Kelvin's harmonic analyzer (analog Fourier analysis)
1876: electric microphone
1878: Abdank-Abakanowicz's analog integraph can solve specific
differential equation
1878: Verea's multiplying machine
1878: Crookes' cathode ray tube
1881: Ventosa integrator
1881: Marquand's logic machine
1884: Felt models 1st 'Comptometer' in macaroni box
1885: Marey declares graphs to be the universal language
1886: CS Peirce proposes electrical version of Marquand's logic
machine
1889: Bollee's Multiplier (multiplication machine) for designing
bells
1889: Thompson Integrating Watt-meter (1st electric meter)

1890: PG Tait describes use of integrators to solve differential
equations
1891: Grenaille-Lucas ruler improves on Napier's bones
1891: d'Ocagne's 1st nomogram
1892: Brunsviga calculators
1893: Torres' analog algebraic equation solver can find roots of
9th-degree polynomials
1893: Steiger's 'Millionaire' calculating machine sells 4655 by 1935
1896: Bollee's 3D cam for multiplying
1897: 1st cathode-ray oscilloscope
1898: Michelson-Stratton 80-element analog harmonic analyzer
1898: Whitehead torpedo adds gyroscopic guidance
1899: magnetic tape recorder
1899: d'Ocagne's nomography (graphs for computing)
no-date: custom sliderules for every engineering specialty

1902: Rechnitzer calculator multiplies and divides
1903: Pastore's belt-driven syllogism-processor
1905: improved Torres equation-solver
1906: naval plotting boards for predicting target location
1906: de Forest's triode amplifier
1908: Anschutz gyroscope
1909: Elmer Sperry and Hannibal Ford's gyroscopic stabilizer
for airplanes

1911: gyroscopic repeater compass
1912: Torres' chess-machine 'Ajedrecista' plays endgame (king
and rook against king alone) improved 1920
1914: Fischer and Harris's analog tide predictor tracks 37
tidal components
WWI: gunners use nomograms to direct anti-aircraft fire
1916: Pollen's Argo clock (realtime naval targeting)
1917: Ford's Range Keeper Mark I
1918: Ford's calculating bombsight
1919: Eccles and Jordan design flip-flop

1920: Monroe desk calculator
1920: Torres' electromechanical arithmometer solves problems
typed in at keyboard, prints answers, theoretically supports
time-sharing
1922: Minorsky analyses autopilot ('gyropilot') for ships
1924: Yokogawa's electronic oscillograph
1925: Jan: Wallace and Snedecor's "Correlation and Machine
Calculation"
1925: Vannevar Bush's Product Integraph integrates complex
curves using analog electronics, wattmeter

1926: Stuart Dodd's Correlators used to predict hybrid yields,
for industrial psych and vocational guidance
1926: Lehmer studies primes using cylinders with holes, 19
bicycle chains and one relay, 60Hz
1927: Harold Black uses negative feedback in phoneline amplifier
1927-1930: Vannevar Bush builds mechanical differential
analyzer to study power blackouts
late-1920s: Ford explores anti-aircraft fire-control
1929: Ed Link's pneumatic analog flight simulator (evolved
into Blue Box Link Trainer)
1929: Roeder's patent application describes advanced flight-sim
concepts
1929: Cannon coins term 'homeostasis'

1930: Westinghouse's AC-network analyzer
1932: Lehmer's photoelectric sieve for prime numbers includes
flip-flop, 5kHz
1934: Hazen's 'Theory of Servo-Mechanisms'
1934: John Wilbur's Simultaneous Equation Solver (will be used
for Leontief equations)
1934: Rejewski's 'bombe' for cracking Enigma cyphers
1935: Bush and Samuel Caldwell begin revised analyzer with
electrical re-programmability
1935: Arma Corp's torpedo data computer
1935: Ray-O-Lite target-shooting game uses photo-tube to detect
lightbeam

no-date: MIT course on mathematical analysis by mechanical methods
1936: Beuken uses analog circuit to simulate heatflow in ovens
1937: Bell Labs' Isograph can solve 15th-degree polynomials
1937? Philbrick simulates linear processes using DC amplifiers
no-date: Philbrick's training-sim 'Polythemus'
1930s: analog simulation of electric power grids
no-date: V. Bush builds code-breaker for Navy (used successfully
on Japanese codes)
no-date: Hannibal Ford builds integrator-based analog gun-directors
no-date: Bell electromechanical flight trainers for PBM, PB4Y2, F6F
no-date: Gordon Iles's pneumatic flight-simulator 'Silloth'

1939? Hart's electromechanical digital device for anti-aircraft
ranging
1939: Bell Labs demos crude speech-synthesizer at World's Fair
1939: German mechanical simulation of A-4 (V2) rocket
1940? Ragazzini at Columbia uses amplifiers for simulations
1940: Rediffusion builds 1st air-navigation trainer; related
developments for gunnery instruction, torpedo attack trainer,
tank trainer, night vision tester, fixed-gun trainer
1940: Nov: Weaver leads project to build first electrical
gun-director with Bell Labs
1940: Dec: Servomechanisms Laboratory under Gordon S Brown in
MIT Electrical Engineering Dept, with 22yo JW Forrester, Albert
C Hall, John O Silvey develops fire-control and radar-antenna
control

1941: electronic analog simulation of A-4 rocket
1941: Shannon's GPAC (general-purpose analog computer) mathematical
model of differential analyzer
1941: Nov: Bell gets funding for T-15 AC analog gun-director
(never produced)
1941-1946: Luis de Florez pioneers 'synthetic training devices' in
Navy Special Devices Division (budget in 1944 will be $10M, staff
of 400)
1942: Stibitz's digital-analog Tape Dynamic Tester for testing
gun-directors
1942: Weaver/Bell's M-9 gun director approved by Army for
production (very successful in 1944) uses analog electronics
(developed using simulations which will inspire 1943's Relay
Interpolator)
1942: Draper's Mark 14 gunsight uses gyroscope (will evolve into
ICBM guidance)

1943: Bell Telephone Labs PBM-3 electronic flight trainer
1943: de Florez discusses 'universal flight trainer' with Bell
and MIT
1943: McCulloch and Pitts' "Logical Calculus of the Ideas Immanent
in Nervous Activity"
1944: Jan: SDD conference explores modifying Bell PBM-3 for
universal flight trainer (ASCA)
1944: Apr: Markham et al "Proposed Method of Ensuring Satisfactory
Handling Characteristics of New Airplanes" (ASCA)
1944: Nov: Forrester foresees ASCA will need 47 equations, 92
variables

1945: spring: Forrester abandons analog ASCA for digital Whirlwind
1945: Ford's mechanical analog flight simulator
1945: Vance at RCA innovates analog circuits
1945-1950: MIT's Dynamic Analysis and Control Lab develops AC
analog computer for Project Meteor (guided missiles)

1946: 08Mar: Wiener and Bateson discuss cybernetic models in
psychotherapy
1947? analog computing using electrolytic tank (Malavard)
late 1940s: analog computer calculates lens-shapes
1948: Wiener's "Cybernetics, or Control and Communication in the
Animal and the Machine"
1948: Project Cyclone at Reeves Instrument Corp develops
general-purpose DC analog computer REAC

1949: Lakatos's GPAC 'Gypsy'
1949: Ed Link's F-80 jet simulator uses electronic analog computer
1949: ERCO (Engineering and Research Corp) builds electronic
flight sims
1949: Draper's FEBE system at MIT (gyro-based aircraft navigation)
1949: Sep: Ratio Club explores cybernetics (incl Turing, Ashby,
Walter)
1949: Nov: Bill Phillips unveils hydraulic economic model

1950: Bettis Atomic Power Lab uses analog network of copper bars
to solve Laplace equations
1950: RCA analog computer to simulate guided missiles
1953: Walter's cybernetic turtles
1953: analog model of atmospheric circulation using rotating pan
of colored liquid
1953: Draper's Space Inertial Reference Equipment (SPIRE)

1954: Draper's MAST (Marine Stable Element) and SINS (Submarine
Inertial Navigation System)
1955: 1st numerical control of machine tools
1958: Ashby's "Introduction to Cybernetics"
1959: Frank Rosenblatt introduces Perceptrons

1961: 1st industrial robots by Unimation
1962: HYDAC (hybrid digital-analog computer)
1963: Buchla's Modular Electronic Music System
1963: Project Gemini analog/digital flight simulator
1969: Apollo Lunar Module uses fly-by-wire

c1970: EML's Electrocomp analog music synthesizers
1970? 1st Pittsburgh Conference on Modeling and Simulation
1973: MIT spins off Charles Stark Draper Laboratory for
gyro-guidance research
1974? von Foerster's "Cybernetics of Cybernetics" (ed)

1982: John Hopfield resuscitates neural nets
1984: Braitenberg's "Vehicles: Experiments in Synthetic
Psychology"

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