Talk:Semaphore line

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Notice:

the sections "Article split?" and "Domel" have been moved to Talk:Semaphore, since the article has been split.
the sections "Semaphore code space", "Total rewrite", "Externa link cleanup", "Copyrighted signals?", have been moved to Talk:Flag semaphore, since the article has been split.

--Once in a Blue Moon (talk) 21:13, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] References in fiction

Isn't it a bit weird that Alexandre Dumas and Ernest Hemingway are mentioned under 'Popular culture'? These would, by any account, be 'high culture'. Although I am not proposing a category 'References in High Culture' it might be a good idea to change the heading to something else like 'References in Art & Litterature' or something. Or just 'References in fiction', how's that??

[edit] Lord of the Rings

I think that semaphores where used in one of the Lord of the Rings novels/movies, although I need to verify this. Any LoTR buffs? GChriss 15:02, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

There was a series of beacons in The Return of the King, which are a much simpler type of 'optical telegraph'. JeffUK 10:52, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
They're actually more akin to those originally used on The Great Wall of China--190.74.122.75 12:13, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reason for rewrite

edit summary by user:diza

no order ,one need to finish this article in order to know what it is about. mechnical arms are mentioned only 2-3 paragraph after they are introduced via ancient name ..etc'.)

--Dodo bird 18:41, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Relative Costs section

Where does the information in the section "Relative Costs' come from?
There's some missing context here - for instance, I presume these figures are adjusted in line with inflation, given the size of the wages in comparison with the "twenty five sous per day" described in the previous paragraph?
The timing "at most ten hours a day" is contradicted by the previous paragraph (where it says that the signalmen must work "at present from half past three till half past eight"). --David Edgar 11:39, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cleanup

The two pages Semaphore (comunication) and Semaphore (communication) are both based on the same article but have been copyedited into two different ways. They should be merged. -- JeLuF 10:17 Dec 31, 2002 (UTC)

I'm not sure we need disambiguation for this anyway -- see Talk:Semaphore -- Tarquin 10:28 Dec 31, 2002 (UTC)

I have also remove - A Manual of Signals: For The Use Of Signal Officers In The Field for being some thing about the army, not semaphore...209.247.21.165 14:25, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

A "symbol" and "code" are different things. A "code" is a scheme to translate a string of "symbols" into natural language. I fixed the article. Also, the title is misspelled- "communication" has two "m"s. I don't have time to fix it. (gotta go).

I have found a great website (personal page) about french optical telegraph history. The Chappe telegraph site contains very interesting materials. I am going to contact the author to propose him to help writing the optical telegraph article. -- Valery Beaud


I think this page needs to be merged with optical communication. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 21:09, 9 Jun 2004 (UTC)

196 symbols is equivalent to a (log(196) / log(2) =) 7.615-bit number. If 36 of these could be sent in 32 minutes, that is a signalling rate equivalent to 36*7.615 bits / 32 minutes = 0.143 bits per second. Not sure if this is relevant enough to put in. - Omegatron 03:04, July 24, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Words and etymology

Something to note, perhaps in the lead-in or later in the historical section:

  • Telegraph first used in 1794, literally "that which writes at a distance," from the French télégraphe, from télé- meaning "far" (from Greek. tele-) + -graphe. The signaling device had been invented in France in 1791 by the brothers Chappe, who had called it tachygraphe, literally "that which writes fast," but the better name was suggested to them by French diplomat Comte André-François Miot de Mélito (1762-1841). The word was first applied in 1797 to an experimental electric telegraph (designed by Dr. Don Francisco Salva at Barcelona); the practical version was developed 1830s by Samuel Morse. Source: [1]
  • Semaphore first used in 1816, probably from the French word sémaphore, literally meaning "a bearer of signals," ultimately from the Greek sema meaning "sign, signal" + phoros meaning "bearer," from pherein meaning "to carry." Source: [2]

A few things that struck me as being included in the article:

  1. Telegraph was used first; semaphore was 20 years later (according to this source).
  2. The Chappe brothers originally named their invention tachygraphe.
  3. The word Telegraph was picked up for the electric telegraph.
  4. Apparently the french didn't use the word telegraph; instead going semaphore? I've been told that the French prefer their own terms for technical things instead of imported words (citing cultural pollution).

- Davandron | Talk 18:21, 23 April 2007 (UTC)