Are Player Pianos Early Computers ?
By John Grant
I'm not going to try to get terribly definitive here because my knowledge on the subject is incomplete (difficult for a Genius to admit) but my understanding is that the mechanical principals of player pianos actually derive from automated European (English?) textile looms developed during (perhaps precipitating) the Industrial Revolution, in which a perforated medium, perhaps similar to band organ "book" music was used to automatically weave repetitive patterns in cloth. It is entirely possible that the Frenchman Forneaux conceived his ideas for controlling a piano by mechanical (pneumatic) means from this technology, culminating in his 1863 patents for the mechanism. But if not the "first", player pianos certainly rank very high (or low, depending on your viewpoint) in the family tree of "computers". Contributions from those with more (documentable) information are welcome. -John Grant
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(Message sent Sun 25 Feb 1996, 19:19:13 GMT, from time zone GMT-0800.) |
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