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Heriberts Aenderungen der letzten X Monate.

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15    <meta name="t29.SVN" content="$Id: search.shtm 108 2009-08-19 17:20:00Z heribert $" />
16    <meta name="t29.thistranslation" content="12.11.2009" />
17    <meta name="t29.comment" content="Initial announcement" /> 
18</head>
19<body>
20<!--#echo encoding="none" var="heading" -->
21<div id="content">
22    <h2><!--#echo var="title" --></h2>
23
24    <h3>Pianola</h3>
25    <p>The technikum29 is quite versatile &ndash; beside all the communication
26       and computer technology we also show very special exhibits: This is
27       a fully executable pianola, year of manufacture about 1910-1915.</p>
28
29    <p>
30       It's a great experience see and hear such old jukeboxes, typically made
31       only of natural materials like leather, gum, wood, bone glue, felt, metal, paper,
32       ivory and glas.
33       <br/>By assembling these elements on an intelligent way, one could
34       build a simple mechanical machine which is especially impressive
35       for today's people. Here at the technikum29, we will show you how
36       this device works, we will explain the basic functionality and
37       play challenging compositions. While having covers removed, you can
38       even see the fascinating mechanics working.
39    </p>
40
41     <div class="box center">
42       <img src="/shared/photos/kommunikationstechnik/pianola.jpg"
43         alt="Picture of the Pianola" width="700" height="618" class="nomargin-bottom" />
44     </div>
45<h3 id="Q1"> technikum29 supports school projects:</h3>
46
47<p>Microcontrollers revolutionize
48and influence next to everything. How can schools participate on these
49developments and perform successful and interesting projects?<br>
50Six pupils of Q1 (12th year in school) of the Albert-Einstein secondary
51school were looking for a suitable idea for their so called "project
52week". This project should be connected to mathematics, physics and/or
53computer science. This is where the technikum29 got involved. The idea
54the pupils came up with was to connect technology from the 1950s with
55modern equipment of 2012. Communication spanning time and technology.<br>
56<div class="box left">
57        <img src="/shared/photos/kommunikationstechnik/arduino1.jpg" width="606" height="335" />
58       </div>
59<p>Traditionally such projects required knowledge only accessible to
60computer scientists, engineers and the like. Often they had to spend
61weeks of reading data sheets, writing cryptic assembly code etc. How
62things have changed! Since 2009 a cheap and versatile module named
63"Arduino" is available - a controller based on the well known ATmega
64328 chip featuring 32 kB of memory. Arduino boards are designed not
65for the expert but for the layman and are the perfect base for
66creative people, artists, designers etc.
67 <br>
68This project focuses on connecting computers to the "real world". The
69small Arduino board can be programmed to be used as an interface for
70nearly everything. The pupils decided to connect an early fax machine
71(a Siemens KF108 made in 1958) to a modern PC.   <br>
72This fax machine is based on a rotating drum which holds the sheet of
73paper to be transmitted to the receiving station. The picture is
74scanned in a spiral movement by a photodetector that slowly moves in
75parallel to the axis of the drum. Of course, this is incompatible with
76more recent fax machines.
77
78The Arduino was planned to act as the interface between this historic
79device and a modern PC. Thus the pupils first had to learn how to
80program such a micro controller which turned out to be quite difficult
81for non-programmers. Nevertheless the software approach has its
82advantages: It is more easily debugged compared with a traditional
83hardware based interface. Thus it only took a single week to program
84and interface the Arduino board to the Siemens fax.
85
86<div class="box left">
87        <img src="/shared/photos/kommunikationstechnik/arduino2.jpg" width="606" height="354" />
88       </div>
89           
90<p>The fax machine generates an auido signal with a frequency of 1.5 kHz
91denoting black pixels to be transmitted. To convert this into a binary
92signal with a 5V level an amplifier circuit is needed that is followed
93by an RC-combination. In addition to that a synchronization signal is
94necessary to signal the start of a new line being scanned. This is
95generated utilizing a reed-contact that is triggered by a so called
96"super magnet" that has been glued onto the axis of the scanner drum.
97The reed-contact thus generates a signal for every revolution of the
98drum which corresponds to a single line being scanned.<br>
99
100The control program for the Arduino was developed by the pupils (the
101source code can be found <a href="/de/lernprojekte/arduino-projekt-programme/"> >>HERE</a>). It allows the picture being scanned, a historic Mickey-Mouse drawing, to be transferred to the PC
102where it is displayed slowly line by line with good resolution.
103
104The experiment was a full success and will inspire future projects.
105
106<p class="small">*) Arduino: The name of this board derives from King "Arduino of
107Ivrea" who lived in medieval times in northern Italy where the
108controller was developed.</small> <br>
109
110         
111        <h3 id="leander">Art in the Museum</h3>
112
113<p>The technikum29 motivates activities that get awards and prices. The latest
114example is that of the young artist Leander A. Schwarzer who transforms
115everyday things into pieces of art. He has developed pictures made from zippers
116that can be opened thus giving the viewer the opportunity to modify the picture
117itself.<br>
118 His latest visit to the technikum29 has inspired him to make art from
119and with punch cards which were the basis of industrialization in the 20th
120century. First the "Terzett" (Trio) was created which consists of three punched
121cards with these irreversible sentences:</p>
122
123<div class="box left">
124        <img src="/shared/photos/start/lk.jpg"  width="250" height="350" class="nomargin-bottom" />
125                <p class="Bildtext small">Picture 1: 3 punch cards with text</p></div>
126               
127        ANOTHER WORLD IS POSSIBLE<br>
128        IMPOSSIBLE IS NOTHING<br>
129        IMAGINE ALL THE PEOPLE<br>
130        <div class="box right">
131        <img src="/shared/photos/start/leander.jpg" alt="Leander Schwarzer" width="313" height="239" class="nomargin-bottom" />
132                <p class="Bildtext small">Picture 2: Leander A. Schwarzer punching cards on an IBM key punch</p>
133               
134                </div>
135
136<p>These cards were hanged on a wall at a distance of 1-2 cm. During the day sun
137rays create shadows of the punched and coded text on the wall behind the cards.
138This work of art was awarded a price at the 32th grafics competition in Austria
139(Innsbruck, 2011). This in turn motivated Mr. Schwarzer to continue his work
140with punched cards. He spent several days at the technikum29 punching excerpts
141from Marx' "Capital" thereby creating a pile of several hundred cards. These
142were shown in the exhibition "A Symbol of Freedom" in Piacenza (Italy). Punched
143cards transform contemporary slogans into visual paradoxes when they create
144their unique shadows.</p>
145<div class="box left">
146        <img src="/shared/photos/start/lk-musik.jpg" alt="Musik aus Lochkarten" width="336" height="188" class="nomargin-bottom" />
147                <p class="Bildtext small">Picture 3: Punched cards running through a "musical clock"</p>
148                </div>
149
150<p>Another work, "Fetish Character of commodities", concatenates the cards
151containing Marx' text fragments. This string of cards is then pulled through a
152mechanism like a musical clock that generates sounds controlled by the holes in
153the cards. So, finally, the "Capital" is transformed into atmospheric sounds.</p><br>
154
155         
156         
157         
158    <h3>Movie projector  "Dresden 1"</h3>
159
160     <div class="box left clear-after">
161        <img src="/shared/photos/kommunikationstechnik/kinomaschine.dresden1.jpg"
162           alt="Photography of the movie projector Dresden 1" width="350" height="630" />
163
164                <div class="bildtext">
165          <p>The technikum29 has a movie projector from 1951 (there are
166             more and even older projectors from the 1930s that are stored in the
167             archive for lack of space).</p>
168          <p>
169             Movie projectors have always been very complex devices. At that time,
170             the bright picture projection was archived with an arc light which was
171             generated between two carbon pencils. The waste heat was deflected via a
172             chimney pipe! <!-- stupid mode... -->
173             Since the pencils got shorter and shorter while the movie went on, they
174             had to be moved continously closer together for producing a constant
175             luminosity. Otherwise the light goes out.
176             <br/>We will repair this device to show an original newsreel from the 1960s.
177         </p>
178           </div>
179        </div>
180               
181        <h3 id="demo">Siemens Demonstration Computer</h3>
182        <div class="box center">
183        <img src="/shared/photos/rechnertechnik/siemens-democomputer.jpg" alt="Siemens demonstration educational computer CPU" width="700" height="587" />
184                <p class="center"><b>Siemens educational computer</b></p>
185        </div>
186
187        <p>This demonstration model was build in 1973, when personal computers were not
188           invented for a long time yet. Engineers had to be trained to understand
189           computer architectures. Therefore, this big education model was constructed.
190           It is a giant implementation of a typical register machine where 126 lamps
191           display all registers, control, ALU and RAM, including the data flow.
192           Featuring a mutable clock pulse and only 4 bit word with, elementary opcodes
193           could be reproduced in a very illustrative way. The device can be toggled to
194           process one instruction or one cycle a time.
195        <br>On the left side, the computer program could be directly "written" by plugging
196           cartidges labeled with assembly instruction mnemonics or numerical values
197           (immediate operands). On this cartiges the user could directly read the binary
198           value of the machine instruction which will be the content of the corresponding
199           random access field. As you might guess, the computer cannot change the program
200           memory without user interaction, so this model actually implements an Harvard
201           architecture, even though the (german) labels on the frontend suggest something
202           different.
203        <br>The picture above shows a currently running program that adds memory cells. It
204           shows that computer word lengths do not limit the length of proccessable
205           numbers.
206        <br>It is a wonderful device that can even be used today to understand the elementary
207           workflow of modern high end desktop CPUs.
208    </p>       
209       
210</div><!-- end of content -->
211<!--#include virtual="/en/inc/menu.inc.shtm" -->
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