Selected Daily Notes Archive (Home Page has current notes)

Oldest (Page 1) to most new (Page 52)

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9) (10) (11) (12) (13) (14) (15) (16) (17) (18) (19) (20) (21) (22) (23) (24) (25) (26) (27) (28) (29) (30) (31) (32) (33) (34) (35) (36) (37) (38) (39) (40) (41) (42) (43)(44) (45)(46) (47) (48) (49) (50) (51) (52)

December 25th, 2003

Merry Christmas. Thanks to everyone who visited this site over the past year, and especially to those who contributed writing. I wish you the best on this most Holy Day. God bless and keep you all.

December 19, 2003

Aside from a garish green, and some topics made too simple, this site is excellent for laypeople and children, anyone confused by or interested by electricity and electronics: Includes a cellular radio discussion. Best through a fast connection: http://www.ieee-virtual-museum.org/index.php external link)

December 17, 2003

A sad day yesterday as Motorola's board of directors elected Edward J. Zander to succeed Christopher B. Galvin as chairman and chief executive. Christopher was the last remaining Galvin family member at Motorola, founded by Paul Galvin in Chicago on September 25, 1928. Just in time for the Great Depression. Their first product was a battery eliminator, which let battery operated radios operate on A.C. power. They later branched into the car radio business, a dauntingly complicated field. All sets required custom fitting into each automobile, radios depended on fragile vacuum tubes, ignition noise problems hadn't been solved, and each radio had to be built one at a time. No assembly line production. Chassis and components were all machined or fitted or soldered together by hand. Times change. There's no Disney at Disney any more. In time perhaps no Ford will work at Ford. But no Galvin at Motorola?

There's no good central history of Mot. You have to read around the edges. Two histories I like are The Founder's Touch: The Life of Paul Galvin of Motorola by Harry Mark Petrakis, published by McGraw Hill in 1965 and A Personal Journal: 50 Years at Motorola by Andy Affrunti, published by Motorola University Press in 1994. (ISBN 1-56946-008-6).

December 16, 2003

Ranch work today but I will keep working on the site later on. I have most of the cellular telephone basics series redone (internal link). The larger type is easier to read than the old and the template I'm using makes the web pages display better on different sized monitors. But learning DHTML and CSS is proving far more difficult than I imagined and I am only getting the new pages done by doing various work-arounds.

December 15, 2003

I'm repeating myself in these daily notes, apologies. December is all about site work so I don't have much to report on telecom-wise. This web site program I'm using is very frustrating. I must stay encouraged and optimistic, though, since it will take weeks to get privateline.com re-done.

Speaking of staying encouraged, click on this link for a photograph showing the proper use of the new cell phone cameras (internal link). The caption belonging to the photo is below:

"Iraqi immigrant Ali Almothafer shows customers in the Arab Kabab restaurant in Dearborn, Mich., a picture of captured Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein." Sunday, Dec. 14, 2003. (AP Photo/John F. Martin) Copyright 2003 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

December 14, 2003

3:15 p.m Update. New pages not working with Netscape 4.5 for the Mac. Until I can figure out why I must suggest you update or change your browser. Explorer 4.5 seems to work fine.

Sigh.The joys of a non-professional web designer. Two problems with the new web pages took all of Saturday to fix. Both problems were caused by the HTML authoring program I am using. Today I will work on fleshing out the index pages. These pages, such as the Wired Telecom and Wireless Pages, list the major files in those categories on the site. Although I like the list found in the old home page, a single page like that just can't display all 370+ files at the site. Please contact me with suggestions and opinions on the new look.

December 13, 2003

5:00 p.m. (P.D.T.) Search engine problem found. My web page program was corrupting the HTML code Google supplied. Now on to fixing pages. The one above should work.

12:26 p.m. (P.D.T.) Search engine feature working poorly. Apologies. Alternate search engine on side pages still working.

Site reconstruction begins today

I'm putting up some test pages today to make sure they work. If they do I will keep adding pages over the next few weeks until the entire site has been redone. Apologies if some pages are missing, incomplete, or hard to find. Use the search engine at the top of each page to find what you want. And keep checking this site through December. I think you'll like the new look and I will certainly enjoy being able to maintain the website efficiently; this makeover is three years overdue and although there will be problems at first, the results will be worth the work and wait.

December 12, 2003

Another great photo

Greetings from a rainy California. Bleak day. This photo, though, should brighten things up. GSM, or PCS in the United States, started in Europe in the late 1980s and has now spread across the globe. It was at first a primarily Ericsson product. The photo below is explained by The Ericsson Chronicle like this:

"1986: The Ericsson demonstrator that went to the Paris evaluation trials. The mobile telephone standing on the top is the model into which the first GSM phone was eventually designed."

Click on the photo or the link for a larger image.

First GSM mobile telephone

December 11, 2003

A work in progress

The new F.C.C. radio history project is a good start at portraying American radio development: http://www.fcc.gov/omd/history/ (external link)

The pages are easy to read and well illustrated. But with all first drafts, there are some mistakes. Perhaps members of the wireless community, supplying corrections, can help them develop a truly accurate story. They first need to correct the record about themselves, then others. This statement is totally inconsistent with the historical record:

"The FCC is pleased to have played a historical role in fostering the innovative atmosphere that enabled creative minds and led to technological breakthroughs. The FCC remains committed today to further fostering innovation in communications ."

Nonsense. From relegating broadcast FM to a high frequency band, almost killing it, hoping to keep Armstrong from developing it, working in league with RCA to keep it suppressed, to delaying cellular deployment for at least 10 years, possibly 15, the FCC does not have a good record of fostering innovation. They don't have to criticize themselves for the past, I don't expect that, but they should only take credit where they deserve it. They're a fine group, they do many things well, but radio advancement in America has been in spite of the FCC, not because of it.

Some dates and details are also wrong. I don't have time to list them all but attributing Martin Cooper and Motorola to inventing the first cellular telephone is just not right, it's a major mistake. AT&T made the first cellular radio four years before (internal link) Just to interest you, it was a payphone. On a train. And it was used in commercial service. What Cooper did was make the first handheld cellular telephone. A fine accomplishment but a natural one. All radio progresses from large radios fixed in place to small ones that are mobile. But I ramble, check out their site and let me know what you think.

December 10, 2003

Power goes out, Ericsson cleverness

With a bang and a flash two power lines outside my house dropped to the ground at three in the morning. My home and several others immediately went dark. The West Sacramento Fire Department responded promptly, Pacific Gas and Electric less so. By afternoon power was restored. Spent the day away from here, doing ranch work in Elk Grove. I mentioned Ericsson.

Ericsson installed their first cellular network in America for Buffalo Telephone in 1984. Buffalo was the so called non-wireline carrier, a competitor to NYNEX Mobile which operated in the same territory. NYNEX was termed the wireline carrier since they were affiliated with the local, wireline telephone company. In any case, this was the start of Ericsson's cellular business in America and they wanted to make sure things went right for the ceremonial first call. As Merurling and Jeans relate in The Ericsson Chronicle:

"Both the Buffalo operator and the Ericsson people were nervous. Some of the testing had not been conclusively successful, indicating that the system, too was still a bit nervous. It was decided to have a plan B for the cut-over so as not to embarrass the Mayor of Buffalo, who had agreed to do the opening honours. Plan B was the 'manhole method." A little man would be concealed down a manhole conveniently situated in the street along which the cortege would roll. At the crucial moment, the limo would stop, right on top of the manhole, and if necessary, the manhole man would emerge furtively and plug a telephone line into the limo. Barring severe problems in the fixed network, there would then be no difficulty making the inaugural call to Sweden."

"However, at the moment of truth the new mobile system did perform perfectly. The mayor made his call, and talked to Carl-Gosta Asdal about -- we know not what. It was a success, and the first non-wireline network in the US was in operation."

My notes indicate that the first non-wireline carrier in the United States was actually Cellular One in Washington, DC, which began operating, with problems, on December 16, 1983, six months before the Buffalo cutover. No matter, Ericsson would soon go on to capture 30% of the cellular radio infrastructure market in America, and they continue to influence cellular in these times. No doubt helped by the cleverness they displayed in Buffalo that day.

December 9, 2003

And you think it's cold where you live

http://www.privateline.com/archive/minilinkericsson.jpg

(internal link to a larger picture (164K)

Click above to view this fine Ericsson photograph. (164K) It's from The Ericsson Chronicle by Merurling and Jeans. The photographer is not credited. The Chronicle is perhaps the best illustrated telephone history, a landmark in corporate biography design. 'Cmon, they're Swedish, they're going to produce something stylish. :-) Nearly 500 pages. I think I paid thirty dollars for it used but it was in great condition. You'll delight any telephone enthusiast this holiday season with a copy.

Stepper stumblings

I'm still trying to explain stepper operation, at least with the limited time I have right now. This ties in to Stephen Crowsen's comments on steppers here (internal link). How about relating the operating to a robot, with the selectors and brushes and contacts being its arms and fingers? Is that a warm and fuzzy enough comparison? Hmm. The subject needs much more pondering:

The difficult thing to imagine, at least for me, is that in a Strowger switch we first set up a mechanical path for a call to travel on. I suppose that applies to a cord switchboard as well. We take the cord and plug it into a jack. We have to make a mechanical connection before we connect electricaly. And with an electrical connection comes the call. A Strowger switch arranges a physical path by placing different mechanical devices, brushes, selectors, and so on, in contact with each other. This allows a complete electrical path. That arrangement is held in place by the switch until the call is disconnected and all of the pieces reset themselves.

Techs trying to trace a call are looking for the physical representation of the call path on the switch. While ignoring all the other calls being placed at the time. There's an exact point in the switch where the "3" and the "7" and the "4" and all the other numbers are connected. By looking at those they can determine the caller's number. But as the writer points out, without memory, the switch will extinguish those points of connection as soon as the call drops. Hmm.

What I'd really like to do is to go to the Roseville Telephone Museum and videotape their demo stepper. Then slow down the tape and make it into a QuickTime .mov file. Then, perhaps, people could see what's happening. Too much to do.

Selected Daily Notes Archive (Home Page has current notes)

Oldest (Page 1) to most new (Page 52)

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9) (10) (11) (12) (13) (14) (15) (16) (17) (18) (19) (20) (21) (22) (23) (24) (25) (26) (27) (28) (29) (30) (31) (32) (33) (34) (35) (36) (37) (38) (39) (40) (41) (42) (43)(44) (45)(46) (47) (48) (49) (50) (51) (52)

Free Telecom Magazines through TradPub.com. Click here to go there