ELL: Fwd: Re[2]: arsclist how to archive your language and other matte

[Brian Levy]

>
>      Dear Brian,
>          All digital media have some form of error-correction, it is built
>      into the "standard." It is one stage up from "error detection", in
>      which you know a fault has occured, but you cannot correct it. (The
>      ISBN Book Numbering system, for example, has error detection which
>      will sound an alarm if one digit is changed or two transposed, so you
>      know you've typed something incorrectly; but you don't know *what* has
>      gone wrong). MS-DOS, Compact Disc, R-DAT, etc. have error-*correction*
>      built into them to match the kind of errors one might reasonably
>      encounter (large ones at nearly the same place for CD, much shorter
>      ones affecting consecutive tracks for R-DAT, etc.) Error *correction*
>      is built into the medium and automatically invoked whenever you
>      reproduce something.
>          But to know *how* something is degrading, one needs to get at the
>      digits *before* error correction. Our CD Tester does this. Audio CDs
>      have two "layers" or error correction (CD-ROMs have three), and our
>      tester lists *all* the errors, where they are, and whether they cross
>      the threshold into audibility. By repeatedly putting the CD into the
>      tester every year (or whatever), and printing-out the results, one can
>      get a picture of how fast it is degrading, and clone the data when it
>      is approacing audibility.
>          Because we haven't much money, ours is a cheap CD Tester, a Model
>      CDA2000 CD Analyser made by CD Associates, Inc., 15A Marconi, Irvine,
>      California 92618. email: <www.cdassociates.com>. We clone our R-DATs
>      onto CD-R as soon as we get them home to minimise the risks; I expect
>      R-DAT (and PCM-701) tape testers exist, but we don't use them.
>          The difficulty is that one doesn't get any understanding of *why*
>      something is failing. A much more expensive *analogue* tester is
>      needed, which measures the *quantities* of things like reflectivity,
>      edge-sharpness, carrier-to-noise ratio, etc. These are *analogue*
>      measurements, and equipment which can do these is at least five times
>      the price; I'm afraid I have no experience of it.
>      Peter Copeland
>
>
>______________________________ Reply Separator
>_________________________________
>Subject: Re: arsclist how to archive your language and other matters
>Author:  Brian Levy <xernaut at yahoo.com> at Internet
>Date:    16/10/2000 10:36 AM
>
>
>One more thing:
>such digital error correction and monitoring, how expensive and from where
>would one get such equipment?
>
>bl
>
>_______________________________________________
>Why pay for something you could get for free?
>NetZero provides FREE Internet Access and Email
>http://www.netzero.net/download/index.html

------------------------------------------
Brian Levy
Cultural Activist
Kiwat Hasinay Foundation:
Preserving Caddo Heritage
211 W. Colorado Ave.
Anadarko, OK  73005  USA
(1) 405-247-5840
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