Analogue Computer Essay

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ANALOG COMPUTER An analog computer is a form of computer that uses the continuously changeable aspects of physical phenomena such as electrical, mechanical, or hydraulic quantities to model the problem being solved. In contrast, digital computers represent varying quantities symbolically, as their numerical values change. As an analog computer does not use discrete (exact) values, but rather continuous (approximate) values, processes cannot be reproduced with exact equivalence, as they can with Turing machines. Analog computers were widely used in scientific and industrial applications where digital computers of the time lacked sufficient performance. Analog computers can have a very wide range of complexity. Slide rules and nomographs are the simplest, while naval gunfire control computers and large hybrid digital/analog computers were among the most complicated. Systems for process control and protective relays used analog computation to perform control and protective functions. SETUP Setting up an analog computer required scale factors to be chosen, along with initial conditions—that is, starting values. Another essential was creating the required network of interconnections between computing elements. Sometimes it was necessary to re-think the structure of the problem so that the computer would function satisfactorily. No variables could be allowed to exceed the computer's limits, and differentiation was to be avoided, typically by rearranging the "network" of interconnects, using integrators in a different sense. TIMELINE OF ANALOG COMPUTERS PRECURSORS This is a list of examples of early computation devices which are considered to be precursors of the modern computers. Some of them may even have been dubbed as 'computers' by the press, although they may fail to fit the modern definitions. Many mechanical

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