Input Handling Research Articles

Function-microcomputers for computer graphics

A wide range of microprocessor, memory and interface circuits with ever improving specifications and decreasing prices permits us to build efficient and inexpensive microcomputers. These devices are therefore particularly suited as special-purpose modules in many areas of data processing. This report offers a design for a net of closely coupled special-purpose microcomputers in computer graphics. This system performs utility functions for device-independent and terminal dependent graphics. It also serves to emulate certain higher-level functions for output and input handling. Because speed requirements differ greatly, both MOS and bit-slice microprocessors can be applied. Applying dynamically microprogrammable processors will permit run-time changes in the function repertoire. This facility is used for emulation and high-level graphics instructions at the microcode level.

Analysis of a new crossed-field amplifier, the "EAL," or electromagnetic amplifying lens

A new form of crossed-field microwave and millimeter wave amplifier which combines an interaction process that results in axial gain with a quasi-optical handling of the RF input and output power is described. Because of its functional similarity to a microwave lens and the additional property of amplification, it is called the Electromagnetic Amplifying Lens. Its advantages are outlined, and its interaction mechanism considered in detail. It is shown that the voltage gain is a linear function of distance in the useful operating range. When the RF level is low, interference between forward- and backward-traveling waves on the waveguide results in loss of control of the space charge. This phenomenon limits the gain available with stable device operation; useful gain of at least 20 db is theoretically possible with a bandwidth of several per cent. The crossed-field interaction principle that is employed assures efficiencies of better than 50 per cent.

The Share 709 System: Machine Implementation of Symbolic Programming

As emphasized in the preceding paper, a fundamental requirement for effective utilization of high speed computing devices such as the 709 is a man-machine communication link that is at once rapid a...

The Queuiac: An Electromechanical Analog for the Simulation of Waiting-Line Problems

Of interest to the Operations Research Office for several years has been the problem of improving the efficiency of Army communications systems. Involved in these studies, besides obvious problems of communications equipments, are problems of organization and human handling operations. To understand and offer solutions to these latter problems, electromechanical simulation equipment has been developed that displays the network of handling operations and provides estimates of congestion at any or all points in the system. In the analog each node consists of a display and register unit upon which columns of lights represent items in a waiting line. Distributions of arrival times of input items and servicing times are programmed on standard teletype tape fed to the analog by teletype transmitters. The register unit at each point of the network displays the queue, computes state occupancy times, and provides estimates of state probabilities. Continuous records of the system states are maintained by pen recorders so that individual delay times and empirical estimates of their distributions may be obtained. The register units may be connected in parallel or tandem, representing various sequential or parallel operations. Available as important queue disciplines are the handling of multiple inputs on a priority basis and the automatic adjustment of servicing rates according to transient loads.