Technological advancements keep coming at an exponentially faster pace, and along with them comes equipment that is increasingly specialized, sophisticated, and complex. Along with the hottest new equipment comes more demand for specialized cables and connectors to hook all this stuff together.
But as complicated as all the new hardware becomes, when it's time for the things to work, it all comes down to signal flow. How an electronic impulse and the information it contains travels through a piece of equipment and from one component to the next determines if and how it functions. A simple example is a telephone. It's easy to hook up a telephone by itself; simply plug the phone plug into the wall jack. But what if you need to add an answering machine? Understanding signal flow makes it easer: the signal comes from the wall jack, enters the answering machine, exits the answering machine, and goes into the phone. That way, the answering machine is located between the wall jack and the phone, and can intercept calls if necessary.
Let's make things a little more complicated. Let's hook up a phone line to a dial-up connection on a computer by using a Catch a Call device, a little box that allows computer users to intercept phone calls while they're online. The signal comes out of the wall jack, into the Catch a Call unit, and then branches out, with one line going to the phone and the other line going to the computer. This branching of the signal allows both computer and phone to receive impulses, and the user can choose to break off the computer signal and answer the phone. Simple, right?
Of course, with sophisticated complex medical and telecommunications hardware, the electronic component becomes much more complex, but a good solid understanding of signal flow makes setting up and operating the most complicated piece of equipment much easier. It's all about signal flow.
Aldene Fredenburg is a freelance writer living in southwestern New Hampshire. She has written numerous articles for local and regional newspapers and for a number of Internet websites, including Tips and Topics.