London meeting: Acorns in Aerospace – 15th October

That’s the aerospace industry, not the space above a Nestlé facility¹.

If you want to find out all about the use of Acorn computers in the aerospace industry then you need to head for the nation’s capital city on the evening of Monday, 15th October. That’s when Keith Emerton – a retired Senior Specialist Test Equipment Engineer – will be talking to the RISC OS User Group of London (ROUGOL) on that very subject.

Keith’s talk will cover more than just the use of Acorn systems in the field, by going back to look at the state of the industry, and how and why computer-based testing became a growing part of it, improving  the quality and safety of deployments.

This will lead into how and why he and a team of engineers reached the conclusion that Acorn’s computers were the ideal system to use, deciding that they alone could deliver the reliability and longevity needed, and thus came to be used to conduct tests on core parts of aircraft systems.

Keith will tell the group some of the well known aircraft that have seen testing by C.A.T.E. – the affectionate name given to the BBC Micro, Archimedes, and A7000-based test equipment – and perhaps he’ll even expand on what that stands for!

Finally, find out how Acorn equipment is still in use in this way – some 30 years after the first Acorn computers were brought in for the purpose – and why only now has the time come for them to be analysed and reverse engineered to create a modern equivalent.

The meeting – which is free to attend – begins at 7:45pm in the group’s usual haunt:

The Blue-Eyed Maid (upstairs in the restaurant),
173 Borough High Street,
London,
SE1 1HR.

The restaurant serves a range of Indian and English food, and both alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages.

There are good public transport links, with Borough and London Bridge stations both just a short walk away. Waterloo and Euston and Kings Cross/St Pancras are just a short trip to one or other of those two.

For any help reaching the Blue-Eyed Maid, or for any other relevant information, ROUGOL can be reached by telephone on 07970 211 629, by email, or via Twitter.

And don’t forget that the London Show – organised by ROUGOL – will be taking place later this month at the St Giles Hotel, Feltham. So put 27th October in your diaries, and start making your travel arrangements now!