[Year 12 IT Apps] Data retrieval technology - 1937 style

[ken price]

I guess they would improve performance by finding lighter and more
"aerodynamic" operators, just as with mechanical hard drives.

At some point the latency and seek time would be limited by the g forces on
the operators. Human blackouts from moving too fast would literally be a
"head crash".

If the individual operators are coordinated by a master operator, it
actually is a RAID 0 system. Perhaps RAID meant Redundant Array of
Inexpensive Desks?

RAID 1 and above would require the copying of letters, which is probably
something the *Státní bezpečnost *(State Secret Police) took on later in
Czechoslovakia's history for other reasons.


Given that it's for sorting and storing letters and other mail, this system
reverses the old saying - "the mail is in the Czech".

kp

On Mon, May 18, 2015 at 1:26 PM, Mark <mark at vceit.com> wrote:

> That was a nifty piece of detective work, Roland!
>
> I'm now wondering whether the latency and seek times of the Prague system
> would have been affected by how much the operators ate for breakfast...
>
> Cheers
> Mark
>
>
> On 17 May 2015 at 23:20, Roland Gesthuizen <rgesthuizen at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Took a bit of digging but I found a source and back story for this
>> photograph if anybody wants to use it.
>>
>> Bciusa.com,. 'Photoshot > Image View'. N.p., 2015. Web. 17 May 2015.
>> http://www.bciusa.com/view_image.jsp?img_id=101869
>>
>> "The offices of the Central Social Institution of Prague, Czechoslovakia
>> with the largest vertical letter file in the world. Consisting of cabinets
>> arranged from floor to ceiling tiers covering over 4000 square feet
>> containing over 3000 drawers 10 feet long. It has electric operated
>> elevator desks which rise, fall and move left or right at the push of a
>> button. to stop just before drawer desired. The drawers also open and close
>> electronically. Thus work which formerly taxed 400 workers is now done by
>> 20 with a minimum of effort. 26th April 1937 “
>>
>> I would agree with Mark that it does look rather like a hard disk drive.
>> Just trying to think how they could configure it as a raid array … hhmmm
>>
>> —
>>
>> *Roland GESTHUIZEN*http://about.me/rgesthuizen
>>
>> On 4 May 2015, at 10:19 am, ken price <kenjprice at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I'm intrigued as to how similar the moving chairs are to read-write heads
>> on hard disks.
>>
>> It's almost as if hard drive technology miniaturised the whole system of
>> " data read/write people in chairs with x/y axis movement". The access
>> times would be subject to the mechanical limitations of moving those Czech
>> guys around the shelving.
>>
>> I wonder if they had head crashes in that system?
>>
>> kp
>>
>> On Mon, May 4, 2015 at 10:13 AM, Laurie Savage <08327998 at pvgc.vic.edu.au>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Databasement?
>>>
>>> LS
>>>
>>> Laurie Savage
>>>
>>> On 1 May 2015 at 13:44, Mark <mark at vceit.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Data retrieval in Prague, 1937
>>>>
>>>> http://cdn.ebaumsworld.com/mediaFiles/picture/2287100/84565802.jpg
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>>
>>>> >> Witty sig goes HERE <<
>>>>
>>>> Mark Kelly
>>>> mark AT vceit DOT com
>>>> http://vceit.com
>>>>
>>>> - Gainfully Unemployed
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________y
>>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
> --
>
> >> Witty sig goes HERE <<
>
> Mark Kelly
> mark AT vceit DOT com
> http://vceit.com
>
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-- 
-- 
Dr Ken Price MACS CP ACCE Professional Associate.
President, TASITE http://www.tasite.tas.edu.au
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