Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1996/07/17
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At 11:43 AM 7/17/96 +0100, Mark Bishop wrote:
>Marc James Small wrote:
>>Well, Leitz designed all Wetzlar-produced lenses from 1949 onwards by
>>computer, so I seriously suspect your friend hadn't a clue as to what was
>>going on
>
>Are you sure? 1949 was the very infancy of the computer, and its use was
>confined to the military and a couple of research machines in universities. I
>seem to recall as early as the late 1950s IBM predicted that, globally, there
>was a market for no more than 16 computing machines ;-)
Gees, Marc, where did you find snippiness? At any rate, here's what
Rogliatti says in "Leica The First 70 Years". Pg. 158 "At Leitz the first
computers were installed as early as 1951". I seriously doubt that those
earliest computers were aiding in lens design much, if any. They probably
were used in book keeping, inventory control etc. This surmise, on my part,
is bolstered by Rogliatti's comment on page 162. "This period from the
mid-fifties was also the beginning of the rapid advances in Leitz lens
design, which have continued ever since, brought about by new optical
glasses from their glass research laboratory and the application of
computers". This time frame seems far more likely.
--
Roger Beamon, Naturalist & Photographer
Docent: Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum
Leica Historical Society Of America
INTERNET: beamon@primenet.com