Open WalterHynson opened 2 years ago
In answer to the "how or why," I'll quote from Sandy Noble's original polargraph site.
"It’s called a polargraph because when I was making it, I thought of it as using a dual-polar coordinates system internally, rather than the regular cartesian system we (and computer systems) tend to use.
In fact, it doesn’t use a polar system at all, it’s actually a kind of double-triangulation coordinate system. The angle of each cord is controlled by the length of both cords, rather than by specifying angle and distance as in with a true polar coordinate. The name “Polargraph” remains as an evocative term, but it isn’t accurate."
Oh, forgot to add, from the same page of the polargraph site, Sandy Noble writes:
What’s in a name?
Polargraph is a particular brand of drawing machine. It is often used in a generic way to describe any of these kinds of machine, and I take that as a compliment to the ubiquity of the project, but it shouldn’t really be used except when referring to this Polargraph project.
It is not a generic name for a drawbot, and the term was not in use before this project began. Well, you know, except to refer to polar graphs.
How or why these things are called polar pen plotters is beyond me as there is no rotating theta axis,It is a X,Y based pen plotter and the name polar leads to identification issues.