Re: they build their calculators like they build their words Message #21 Posted by Palmer O. Hanson, Jr. on 29 Oct 2012, 11:06 p.m., in response to message #20 by db (martinez, ca.)
Maybe someday I will meet an error-free individual. Until then I will contiinue to advocate methodologies which tend to avoid errors.
The development of the slide rule involved a long series of missteps. The missteps began with the inmplementation of the two logarithmic cycle A and B scales when it is a routine exercise to take the square and square root using single cycle C and D scales.
Another misstep occurred when the S and T scales were added to the Mannheim configuration such that the S scale worked with the A and B scales while the T scale worked with the C and D scales. That meant that multiplication of a tangent function by a sine function involved reading one function from one scale and reentering it on another scale, or as we did in the olden days, do the work with the A, B and S scales by entering the tangent function as a division of the sine by the cosine. Using the A and B scales meant that it was difficult to maintain three digit accuracy at the high end.
That misstep was remedied when the ST scale was introduced so that all three trigonometric scales were on the slide and worked with the C and D scales.
Then the so-called Darmstadt configuration was introduced and the S, ST and T scales were moved from the slide to the frame and, once again, if the user needed to multiply trigonometric functions of two different angles he had to read the second trigonometric function from the D scale and reenter it on the C scale. Truly, a dumb idea.
The combination of a slide rule and an Addiator which occurred as early as 1952 had the problem of concatenation but I suspect that was the best that could be done with a handheld device at that time. The combination of a slide rule with a non-scientific calculator as in the TR1 and its successors can only be understood as an inept mechanization which failed to anticipate the inevitable advent of a machine the HP-35. i
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