Computers: the answer to real-time flight analysis

The development of real-time data processing facilities has become an important task for the missile test ranges. The requirement for efficient test programs and the desire of the missile developers to have the results of missile firings "as soon as possible" after the flight, are pressing and many studies and developments for improved test facilities with faster data processing are being undertaken. These developments can be broken down into two major categories: instrumentation and computers for the reduction and analysis of the measured data. As long as the data are only required "very fast," say one or a few hours after the flight, the main problem is the data collection, transmission, and conversion to make them in the proper forms available to high-speed computers for which the further reduction and print-out presents no particular difficulty if enough computer capacity and peripheral equipment is available.