IEE Control & Automation Division: Chairman´s address. Communications in control

Communications and control can be regarded as complementary components of an overall system, and there should be an adequate match between them at all interfaces. Communications degraded by noise, delays and interruptions can have adverse effects on control performance, but can be mitigated by the proper use of redundancy and by such operations as modelling, statistical filtering and prediction. Errors occurring at the source should be identified and allowed for. Illustrative examples include air navigation, the CEGB automatic-control experiment looked at in retrospect, and future trends in computer-aided command and control on the battlefield. In the last of these, the complexity of man-machine interactions brings special problems in design, in programming and in adapting the organisation to incorporate the new techniques with maximum effectiveness.