Re: Changes in Technologies


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Posted by Alan Hakim on April 29, 2007 at 17:35:51 from 212.137.226.221 user awhakim.

In Reply to: Re: Changes in Technologies posted by Peter H on April 28, 2007 at 18:54:15:

Fame at last! But I'm afraid I can't remember switchboards as far back as when AR was writing that - I'd only just got to reading the books.
There were several different technologies at the time, largely depending on the size of the switchboard. The village exchange would probably have very few lines, and be as Peter suggests: the local subscribers would have a shutter, which was normally out of sight leaving a blank hole in the board, but dropped down to show its number when the subscriber picked up the phone. If you jiggled the receiver rest, the shutter would go up and down. Larger exchanges had lights, which would flash on and off.
But that required a central power supply, similar to phones today. If we move on from PP to PM, the technology seems to have gone backwards. Nancy "rang up the exchange". That sounds like the locally-powered phone with a crank handle you had to wind to call the exchange. For those, there was a permanently visible shutter, held upright by a hook which could be moved by an electro-magnet. Winding the crank moved the hook, which let the shutter fall down, revealing a different coloured area. But no amount of further winding or jiggling had any more effect. In fact, the shutter stayed down until the operator manually hooked it back vertical.
In practice, small switchboards had a buzzer which sounded whenever a shutter was activated, though I think it could be switched off if the postmistress wasn't in the mood to be rushed.

As for modern mobiles, I am amazed at their cover in the Middle East. My daughter Frances is just back from the Wadi Rum desert in Jordan, where there was full mobile cover. But I can't get a signal in my kitchen here in Hampshire; I have to go upstairs before the mobile will work.


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