The Evolution of Telecommunications

Telecommunications is a kind of application software used to share or relate information. In the early days, telecommunications came in the form of beacons, smoke signals, signal flags, drumbeats, lung-blown horns, loud whistles, but now it has evolved into a higher form of technology. It has now gone electrical in the form of certain devices beginning with the telegraphs, telephones, and radio.

Some of the pioneers of electrical telecommunications were Charles Wheatstone and Samuel Morse who invented the telegraphy which is a long-distance transmission of messages that is converted into a code only known between the sender and receiver. Other pioneers include Alexander Graham Bell who invented the telephone, Nikola Tesla, Edwin Armstrong and Lee de Forest who developed the radio, and John Logie Baird and Philo Farnsworth, the television.

Before there was electrical telecommunications, there was an ancient form of telecommunications which was first introduced by the ancient Greek. The ancient Greek used the hydraulic semaphore system in the 4th century BC. This system makes use of hydraulic semaphores, which are vessels filled with water and a vertical rod that had inscribed messages floating in it. This functioned as an optical telegraph that applied visual signals to send a message. The sender would use a torch to signal the receiver and then they would open the spigots at the bottom of the containers until the water reached the desired code.

Eventually, the electrical telegraph was developed which laid a foundation for creating advanced and improved devices such as the BlackBerry Enterprise Server Express 5.0. This was invented by Charles Wheatstone, but Samuel Morse, together with Joseph Henry, developed his own. Morse was the one who developed the Morse code which further improved the electrical telegraph. The Morse code is a method to send messages in the form of on-off tones, lights, or clicks.

Of course, there would be no BlackBerry Enterprise Server Express CAL if it were not for the invention of telephones. Alexander Graham Bell wanted to improve the telegraph, so he designed a device that could transmit many messages electrically. The Morse code, though useful, was limited, because it could only send one message at a time.

This problem with the telegraph inspired Bell to develop a kind of device that could easily relay messages as well as connect people. Bell’s vision is reflected in what is now the BlackBerry Enterprise Server Express 5.0.