Slide rule emulator

There were thousands of slide rules produced, many of them with interesting scale layouts. Some of them are rare and expensive nowadays, or just not easy to find. So, to be able to try different calculations on these rules I have written this slide rule emulator. It will allow you to build any rule from scales from supplied scale list. I believe, this list contains enough scales to build a lot of interesting rules, but it is by no means full. From time to time I add new scales to this list. Please tell me if you think some scale not in the list should be there.

Requirements

Internet Explorer 5.0 or FireFox 1.5

Emulator keyboard/mouse control

Drag the cursor or the slide with your mouse to change their position. Alternatively, you also can use keyboard:

Use z key to move cursor on pixel left and x key to move cursor one pixel right.

Shift+Z and Shift+X will move the slide in the similar fassion.

Ctrl key will increase movement speed.

f key will flip the (duplex) rule. It is possible to describe slide rule with more than 2 sides. In this case f will cycle trough all of them.

v key will re-adjust scale heights. Use this key if the scales of slide rule are at some distance from each other. Because of the delay needed to download the scale image emulator sometimes calculates height of scale incorrectly.

b key will bring the edit controls to enter new slide rule layout.

h key will bring keyboard reference page.

Choose a slide rule from a list

Pick one from an extensive list of slide rule layouts.

Create a custom slide rule

Enter slide rule layout and click "Create" button.

Layouts are desribed in following way:

scales are listed from top to bottom;
scales are separated with comma (",");
scales on a slide are placed inside [ and ];
each scale entry has optional label in double or single quotes immediately followed with alphanumeric scale ID;
back side (if present) is separated with /.

Although there was little consistency between slide rule makers on how they named the scales, some combinations of scale and its label were pretty much standard. For example logarithmic scale located on a slide would almost always be labeled "C" and when located on a body it is almost always labeled "D". Such common combinations of label and scale ID (aliases) are predefined in the emulator and can be used to shorten layout descriptions. Complete list of aliases and scale IDs is here.

Please note that in algorthm descriptions I use scale label of a specific slide rule rather then scale ID. The reason for this is that often I simply copy algorithms from appropriate slide rule manuals and those are mostly unaware of wonderful and clear scale nomenclature of this emulator and stubbornly insist on using their own labelling system.

Here is a link to a layout entry form in detached window: micro builder. Just enter (or copy-and-paste) slide rule description into edit box and press button when you need one.

Referencing

If you maintain slide rule related page, you may be interested in adding some virtual slide rule functionality to it. See "How to embed slide rule emulator" page for explanation how to do this.

Copyright and license

"Yet another slide rule emulator" is copyright (C) 2000 by Andrew Nikitin. This software is provided ``as is'' and without any express or implied warranties, including, without limitation, the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose. You may use it free of charge. Harmful when swallowed, not for use as a flotation device, keep away from children.

Other emulators on the net

There are other slide rule emulators on the net. Usually they reproduce one or several existing slide rules in great detail (often, including owner's name scratched on the face of a slide rule).

Hemmi 153
Internet Slide rule, includes unit conversions scale
Derek's Virtual slide rule gallery -- a line of Picketts, including N909 (converter), N904 (decimal keeper scales), N525 (statistical)

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