Communication Systems and Infrastructure
| Page | Provides | Importance | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Communication Systems and Infrastructure | communications | society:organising | 2 - Desirable |
| Long-distance Communications | communications, society:organising | 3 - Important | |
| One-way Communications | communications | society:organising | 2 - Desirable |
| Two-way Communications | communications | protection:defence, society:organising | 3 - Important |
A (very) brief history of Telecommunication Technologies
As an important aside — and given that one of the goals of this project is to not just capture things as they were back when one could build complete systems (and even most of the necessary components) from scratch but how such designs can be simplified or improved upon using more recent techniques and tools — it might be insightful to see, at a glance, how communication technologies developed over the course of human history, and how quickly things advanced, starting around the turn of the 20th century.
Please note that the following table is not intended to be either exhaustive nor precise (although the included references can serve as a starting point for the more historically curious), and quite a few later developments have been omitted (e.g. for telephony alone, subsequent development of import could include multiplexing, automated routing, compression, encryption, etc.) as its focus is on the appearance of new and 'revolutionary' technologies, not their entire history.
| Date (ca.) | System | Category | Typical Range | Typical Latency | Enabling Development(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Antiquity1) | Smoke signalling | Visual | line-of-sight | real-time | Shared codes |
| 200 BCE2) | Signal fire-based semaphores | Visual | line-of-sight — 'national' | real-time — hours | Shared codes, repeater networks |
| 1520 | Flag-based semaphores | Visual | line-of-sight | real-time | |
| 17903) | Semaphore signalling | Visual | line-of-sight — national | minutes | Telescopes, transmission and acknowledgement protocols |
| 18204) | Heliograph | Visual | line-of-sight — national | minutes | Mirrors / shutters, telescopes, transmission and acknowledgement protocols |
| 18305) | Electric telegraph | Electro-mechanical | ~40km — continental | minutes | Electricity, cabling, input/output devices |
| 18706) | Telephone | Electro-mechanical | ~20km — global | real-time | Basic analogue electrical devices and theory, hierarchical switching |
| 18807) | Photophone | Opto-electrical | 200m — line-of-sight | real-time | Light-dependent element or PV cell, parabolic reflectors |
| 19008) | Radio Telegraph | Electrical | ~1,000km — global | “ | Basic resonant electrical and EM theory, spark gaps, CW transmitters |
| 19109) | Radio | Electrical | ~300km — global | ” | Analogue and power electronics, modulation schemes |
| 1920– 10) | Amateur Radio | Electrical | “ | ” | Affordable electronic components |
| 193011) | Radiofax | Electronic | “ | ” | Image-scanning and reproduction, more advanced modulation schemes |
| 197012) | Computer networking | Electronic, IT | “ | ” | Digital computers, Modems, information theory, networking protocols |
| 197513) | Mobile telephone | Electronic | “ | ” | MOSFETs, cellular networking protocols, higher energy-density rechargeable batteries |
| 198014) | Usenet | IT | “ | hours | More pervasive networking (dedicated or dial-up), UUCP / NNTP |
| 198515) | FidoNet | IT | ” | hours | Affordable / home computers and Modems |
| 198516) | The Internet | IT | “ | real-time | Inter-networking and application-layer protocols |
| 1995– 17) | Software Defined Radio | IT | ” | “ | Commodity DSPs / RF-frequency 'Modems' |
| 199518) | Wikis | IT | ” | “ | The Web, local web-servers |
| 200519) | Git | IT | ” | — | Models of version control and conflict resolution |
See Also
Specific Resources
Related Categories
| Page | Designation | Provides | Importance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Communication Systems and Infrastructure | capability:communication | communications | 2 - Desirable |
| Deployable Computing Platforms | capability:computing:deployable | communications, equipment:sci-eng | 2 - Desirable |
| Long-distance Communications | capability:communication:long-distance | communications, society:organising | 3 - Important |
| One-way Communications | capability:communication:one-way | communications | 2 - Desirable |
| Two-way Communications | capability:communication:two-way | communications | 3 - Important |
| User-devices | capability:computing:user-device | communications, equipment:sci-eng, satisfaction:learning | 2 - Desirable |
| Categories (net.forthefall/kb:ontology:categories) | |
|---|---|
| Designation | capability:communication |
| Provides or enables | communications |
| Provides or enables (secondarily) | society:organising |
| Zone(s) | 4 - Semi-managed, 5 - Unmanaged wilderness, 6 - Regional (local), 7 - Regional |
| Importance | 2 - Desirable |