New Philosophies in Automatic Power Unit Controls: An account of the effect of the introduction of digital computers on aircraft automatic systems given in a paper first presented at the last BALPA Symposium

TRADITIONALLY, progress is presented as a steady advance, a smooth upward curve with time. It is not really like that at all. It is made in sudden steps followed by a period of consolidation. All the same, there is a basic trend or principle behind these jumps of progress which, themselves, are set off by bringing out some radically new process or method.