Under Zheng Fuguang's introduction, Zhu Jingyuan carefully observed the dot matrix imaging fax machine.
Then I went to see another important invention - the negative feedback triode signal amplifier.
In layman's terms, it is a tube amplifier, which is later called a "tube amplifier" in the music circle.
Of course, music players are all retro when they do this, but if Zhu Jingyuan does it now, it is pioneering.
Before the advent of amplifiers, telephones and phonographs had speakers.
But they are all directly driven by the sound source signal, and there is no signal amplification process, so the sound cannot be very loud.
Just like a passive speaker plugged directly into the headphone jack of a computer or mobile phone.
You can make a telephone receiver, but you can't make a loudspeaker for broadcasting.
At present, wherever shouting is needed in the world, people with loud voices still do it.
At most, you can add an iron speaker to emit sound in a directional manner through physical effects and increase the volume in the target direction.
With a power amplifier, it's different. You can continue to broadcast high-intensity speeches over a large area.
And it is also an important equipment required for public broadcast of movies.
"Lattice" is a future-oriented technology and design, and it is a basic technology in information dissemination and recording, so the current performance is not very intuitive and strong.
The signal amplifier is the technology at the end of information transmission, and the display is very intuitive and revolutionary.
Zhu Jingyuan stood in front of a workbench, looking at a brand-new microphone in front of him, and then at the two specially made large loudspeakers placed on the other side of the room.
Zheng Fuguang checked the equipment and powered on the speakers and microphones.
"Zi——"
The typical noise of old-fashioned speakers that Zhu Jingyuan remembered from his previous life sounded, which made Zhu Jingyuan think that there should be no problem with this design.
After all, the power amplifiers and large loudspeakers that were just made are not a problem when they are turned on and make loud noises.
The loud blast indicates that the speaker is loud enough.
After the noise was reduced to an acceptable level, Zhu Jingyuan also gathered his emotions and began to read poetry into the microphone:
“Wind and rain bring spring home, and snowflakes welcome it.
“The cliff is already covered with hundreds of feet of ice, but there are still beautiful flowers and branches.
"Qiao doesn't fight for spring, she only repays spring when it comes.
"When the mountain flowers are in full bloom, she smiles among the bushes."
The two loudspeakers vibrated with Zhu Jingyuan's voice, and a huge and surging sound came out.
Compared with later generations of high-end speakers, the noise and noise floor of this thing are a bit loud, but it is acceptable.
Zhu Jingyuan himself was quite satisfied and directly gave instructions on the spot:
"Okay, this thing is very important. If there are no problems, we can mass-produce it as soon as possible.
“They are all used in yamen and dental offices in various places, as well as on newly built large warships, especially aircraft carriers.
"It's a waste of manpower to arrange for a group of strong men to be responsible for shouting."
The craftsmen headed by Zheng Fuguang immediately nodded solemnly and agreed:
"Understood... Your Highness, don't worry..."
Craftsmen may not be able to see all of the great role and potential of power amplifiers, but they are all aware of its importance.
It will be an epoch-making super invention that will affect countless industries such as military, administration, education, art, culture, propaganda, etc.
People were summoned on warships and armies, public orders were delivered, broadcast announcements were made in government offices and dental offices, and music was played in large-scale spaces.
Turning newspaper content into recordings and playing them directly through loudspeakers is a new form of media.
In special areas, it is also possible to carry out targeted propaganda against enemies and hostile forces, and the prepared sounds can be played continuously in a loop.
Zhu Jingyuan stayed in the laboratory for a whole day and continued to observe and inspect two new pieces of equipment.
Write down all the problems you can think of and possible improvements and optimization directions.
Let Zheng Fuguang sort it out and send it back to the Ministry of Industry and the factory of Daming Airlines.
When Zhu Jingyuan left, Zheng Fuguang couldn't help but ask his companions:
"The poem His Highness recited at that time...does anyone remember it? Does it really feel so strange to me?"
A group of craftsmen looked confused and shook their heads to express that they had never heard of it. Then someone said:
"Is there a possibility that the words His Highness recited at that time were written by His Highness himself?"
The scene immediately fell into silence. I confirmed that I had never seen this poem before, and then tasted it in my heart.
There are many poems praising plum blossoms, but the angle of this poem is very unique and full of connotation.
After the Renwu Dynasty, the Ming Dynasty established relatively standard collective school education, and the educational content also shifted to natural sciences.
But the traditional Chinese language courses are still very important, far more than Zhu Jingyuan’s previous life.
Among various examinations, the proportion of Chinese language is basically around 40%.
Since there is no foreign language, the proportion of other courses is similar to Zhu Jingyuan's previous life.
Students who graduate from regular middle schools are basically good at reciting poems and writing lyrics. College students are not much different from the traditional literati of the past.
But being able to write poetry and writing good poetry are completely different concepts.
Zhu Jingyuan has never shown that he has this ability before.
Today's inadvertent performance made the craftsmen a little surprised.
Zhu Jingyuan himself was not prepared to be a copywriter, so he just randomly found a poem and recited it.
Forgetting to distinguish the era of the poem, I simply finished reading it as soon as I started speaking.
I returned to my room, had dinner with my mother and two concubines, and started studying the typewriter and computer the next day.
Zhu Jingyuan himself knew that there was actually a demand for Chinese character typewriters.
As industrialization becomes deeper and deeper, the pace of society becomes faster and faster, and there are more and more writing-related jobs.
The scope of use of purely transactional words is getting wider and wider, while the proportion of the scope of use of artistic and literary words is getting smaller and smaller.
Correspondingly, the demand for flexible printing will increase.
Chinese character typewriters actually exist now. They are similar to the Shu typewriters that appeared in history.
It is just a simplified movable type printing machine that requires manual pressing of each word.
Currently, not many people use it, and the official documents of the Ming Dynasty are still mainly copied.
Of course, what Zhu Jingyuan wanted to design was not this kind of typewriter.
Zhu Jingyuan stayed in the laboratory for most of the day, returned to his room in the afternoon, and began to write his own design plan.
Chinese character typewriters are very different from alphabet typewriters in logic, but some aspects can be learned from.
Tessie's alphabet typewriter was initially unable to switch between upper and lower case.
There are two sets of letter keys on a large typewriter, one for uppercase letters and one for lowercase letters.
Only one alphabet can be typed on a small, lightweight device.
Later, someone invented a switching device and a caps lock device that used the same letter key to type two letters.
In fact, the pattern of two letters is made on a metal piece in staggered positions.
On a Chinese character typewriter, all the keys may have to be switch keys.
You can no longer use a hammer to hit the paper for printing.
The number of hammers arranged side by side on a flat surface is limited, and it is destined to be unable to type at least several thousand Chinese characters.
The structure of a Chinese character typewriter must be three-dimensional.
A three-dimensional mechanical database must be able to accommodate at least thousands of commonly used Chinese characters.
At the same time, prepare a reasonable search plan and associate it with the keys.
The required Chinese characters can be filtered out through the mechanical database driven by buttons or driven by auxiliary electric power.
Turn the paper over and press it on the screened lettering template.
This keeps repeating.
There are two key points in making this thing.
One is a mechanical Chinese character database that contains nearly thousands of completed standard Chinese characters.
This design can refer to Lin Yutang’s design.
Historically, Lin Yutang painstakingly designed a rather clever Chinese character typewriter.
However, due to various reasons such as social environment, cost and manufacturing difficulty, it did not become popular in the end.
However, the design idea was inherited by Americans, who used a similar design when early computers output Chinese characters.
The mechanical font can be made into a three-layer drum structure.
A large hexagonal roller, with a hexagonal middle roller on each side, and six small rollers on each middle roller.
Each small roller has eight sides, and there is a row of about thirty-two Chinese characters on each side.
However, the operation method needs to be changed, because Lin Yutang's machine has too many buttons. There are sixty-four structural buttons, plus eight numerical buttons for word selection, for a total of seventy-two.
Zhu Jingyuan's current design must take into account the rationality of the universal layout of computer keyboards in the subsequent electronic computer era.
It would be best if the basic keys could be reduced by half, to about thirty-two, and the number of number keys should not exceed forty.
There is no need to be strict about three keys to produce one character, and the standard can be relaxed to four keys to produce one character.
Press the first key to rotate the corresponding large drum and find the designated middle drum.
Press the second key to rotate the corresponding middle roller and find the designated small roller.
Press the third button to move the paper tray and align it with the words on the small roller.
Press the fourth button, rotate the small roller, and press the final word.
This combination can accommodate more than nine thousand Chinese characters.
If it is not enough in actual use, you can increase the number of large and medium rollers to eight.
That would be more than 16,000 Chinese characters.
The second key point is the method of arranging and screening to find the words to be used.
To a certain extent, this problem is to use a mechanical structure to create an "input method" program.
In order to reduce the code repetition rate, this input method can only use shape codes. The best reference solution is the Wubi input method.
The Wubi input method is called Wubi. In fact, each character can be entered with up to four keystrokes.
In fact, the most important reason is that Zhu Jingyuan still has some impression of Wubi, which he has learned specially, and knows how to compose the root characters.
I have basically no understanding of other shape code input methods.
Zhu Jingyuan probably still remembers the design logic of Wubi input method in his mind.
Although Zhu Jingyuan does not completely remember all the roots and rules, he does not need to restore it himself.
I have the most powerful helper in the world.
I only need to roughly describe the logic and direction so that the craftsmen in the Ministry of Engineering can complete the equipment production.
Just let the masters of the Ministry of Rites organize and standardize Chinese characters, arrange and filter the character library, and sort out the root list.
But even this design logic cannot be written in a day or two.
The key is to design an electric drive structure for this typewriter.
The typewriter can be made to be manually typed or typed automatically through input signals.
This is another piece of complex mechanical engineering.
The entire device may be more complicated than a mechanical clock.
The early failure rate and yield rate of this thing will definitely be on the verge of getting out of control, and the early production cost will definitely be very high.
Lin Yutang's typewriter cost a total of US$120,000 to build.
This was twenty to thirty years' wages of American workers during the interwar period, and they could buy two P51 Mustang fighter jets.
As a result, it malfunctioned in front of potential investment companies during its first public presentation.
It took more than an hour to repair on site, but as a result, no one invested in it, and in the end there was no chance of being put on the market.
Although Lin Yutang may have fully accounted for the thirty years spent on typewriters, the cost still seems very high.
Zhu Jingyuan basically skipped the fumbling process and could directly try to make the finished product. The total cost would definitely be greatly reduced.
But early costs could still soar to the level of a car.
But Zhu Jingyuan didn't care.
The biggest difference between Zhu Jingyuan and Lin Yutang is not that he is a time traveler, but that he is rich and powerful.
The richest prince in the Ming Dynasty and the second richest man in the world could push this thing to maturity with his own money.
In fact, the year after Lin Yutang's demonstration failed, IBM came up with a Chinese character typewriter that was simpler and rougher, requiring forced memorization of all Chinese character codes, but with a lower failure rate and barely usable.
IBM specially found a team to promote it all over the United States.
The typewriter that Lin Yutang spent decades building was more sophisticated but frequently broke down. In this case, it was impossible to get investment.
But this situation will not happen to Zhu Jingyuan.
