PERSPECTIVE
Has Porcelain Been‘ Hard- Wired’ Into the Minds of Power Engineers?
Researchers at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland have recently developed a revolutionary keyboard that significantly increases the speed and efficiency of typing. Tests show that users were soon able to reach 37 words / min on the new device compared with only about 20 words / min on a standard QWERTY keyboard.‘ QWERTY’, as everybody knows, is the acronym given to the layout of letters of the alphabet on virtually every keyboard in existence( with obvious exceptions for certain languages).
Now, it can only be termed‘ miraculous’ that QWERTY has survived to this day, seeing that it was invented by American Christopher Sholes in the 1870s and intended for a purely mechanical typesetting device. Apparently, the main aim was to slow typing so as to prevent the mechanical metal arms from being jammed together by clashing at too high a speed. Sholes accomplished this by placing the most frequently used letters as far apart as possible. It was then left to the typist’ s fingers to do the extra work.
However, in spite of the impressive results of their new keyboard, the Scottish researchers are not overly optimistic of changing anything soon. Many have tried – and failed – to challenge QWERTY’ s supremacy over the decades. It has even been postulated that the QWERTY layout becomes‘ hardwired’ into our brains from the moment we first use a keyboard.
Let’ s look at another invention from about that same era 140 years ago. Electrical glazed porcelain was developed initially for telegraph insulators but has gone on to become the dominant insulating material found at virtually every outdoor substation up to and even over a million volts. Over the past 25 years, more advanced alternatives have been developed and perfected. Yet, in spite of their many claimed advantages, these have yet to make a dent in porcelain’ s near total dominance.
Can it be that, as with QWERTY, people in the power engineering field cannot seem to break the traditional link between insulation and porcelain?
Of course, porcelain has earned its place at the top by being a relatively cheap, yet mostly reliable and long lasting insulator( see our Tribute to Porcelain article on p. 124) Still, if anything should be‘ hardwired’ into the minds of the electrical engineering community these days it is not hesitating to utilize any proven new technologies that help transfer power more cost-effectively, more reliably and more safely. Little else should matter.