I'm betting that there is probably no more than ONE person who follows me here who who already knew that the "beep" tones at the start and end of Apollo spacecraft voice transmissions are called "quindar tones". - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAAFkjYxWj4
Isn't that pretty common knowledge among anyone who heard original recordings? "What are these beeps" is very easy to look up and is an obvious question to ask.
@robryk So, you're saying YOU knew? Right?
@lauren
... yes?
@robryk OK, but my point is that for all these years the vast majority of people have called them by the highly technical term BEEPS.
Even if they knew what they were for? I'd expect it's kinda hard to learn that without learning the weird name.
Because it's not obvious that this is their function (as in, that their function is purely ground-side -- do you think that people assume these are tones for switching _something_ on and off and leave it at that?). I'd expect all sources that explain what they are more exactly for to mention the name.
@robryk I've pretty always seen them considered to be simply a signal that a PTT or VOX starts or stops. That seemed completely logical, and in fact is correct, so assuming they had some specific name beyond that is something of a stretch.
I just wondered whether this was a first system of that kind and was extremely surprised to learn that proto-CTCSS was already used in 50s: https://www.repeater-builder.com/tech-info/ctcss/ctcss-overview.html
@robryk Again, most people never even thought about them. Those that did called them beeps, or sometimes vox beeps. Why would most observers, even technical ones, assume there were more specific names for them?