U.S. Department of Health and Human Services | National Institutes of Health
changes.mady.by.user Nick Piegari
Saved on Mar 13, 2023
Saved on Mar 23, 2023
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Figure 7. Photograph of the Quantimet-TV and control-console for the RTPP using the BMON2 software [40, TR-21, TR-21b, TR-23]. This was taken after we had moved the RTPP to the Park Building in Rockville, MD. (Reproduced from a figure with permission from Environmental Health Perspectives, 1980 []). The control desk had a microscope joystick (X,Y) and Z-axis (focus) control; knobs (connected to A/D converters read by the PDP8e), switches and lights that could be configured in various ways by the BMON2 software. The small box shown in the lower left allowed us to control the 4 edges of a frame as (X,Y) positions. It used four bi-directional two-level spring-loaded switches in a (North, South, East, or West) configuration. These switches came from the LINC-8 and were perfect for this type of control. This allowed us to easily control the direction of a cursor - much as is done today using the mouse, which did not exist at the time). Real-time video control was performed using the RTPP buffer memory controller hardware, which in turn was configured by the PDP8e. The control desk gave us a lot of flexibility - even if its complexity was sometimes compared to that of the starship Enterprise. Various programs (BMON2, FLICKER [13], LANDMARK in the GELLAB-I system [15, 17, 31], and others) could use that subset of the controls most appropriate for the particular application.
