Industrial electronics: Controllers get smarter, thyristors make inroads, hardware/software goes standard

More automation and computer hierarchical and direct control in manufacturing and testing mark the present and the near future in industrial electronics. The energy crunch is being felt, both directly and indirectly. Energy-conserving testing systems for automobiles are being devised and programmable controllers are being applied in industrial processes to increase efficiency and economy. Power semiconductor devices are growing bigger and getting smarter. The new buzzword is “standardization,” both in instrumentation and in software. CAMAC, a standardized scheme for interfacing computers to data transducers and actuators in on-line systems, and for the design and use of modular electronic data handling equipment, has begun to play a role in industrial control and measurement, both in the U.S. and in Europe. And a unified industrial FORTRAN computer language is in the works.