Re:The Lost Art of Nomography (2009) [pdf]
by doodlebugging on Monday January 02, 2023 @11:39AM
(#34219936)
This takes me back. The first bit of programming I ever did that wasn't RPN on an HP-11C involved digitizing nomograms from technical tool output interpretation guides published by oil and gas service companies for each of their downhole tools. We located guidebooks in the university library, at estate sales and garage sales, by visiting service company offices, etc and had a large collection that eventually allowed us to code, in BASIC (later QuickBASIC and eventually QuickC and C++) the equations for each of the lines involved in the interpretation. We even did the most complicated tornado chart corrections on a Compaq Deskpro sewing machine cabinet style 8086 or 80286 PC back in the mid-late 80's. Mainframe interpretation suites couldn't do the things we did.
Our process was pretty convoluted and involved the PC and a 128k Mac (upgraded to 512k later) with some Mac software that didn't exist in PC world at the time. We would digitize the nomogram curves or lines top to bottom and include any points where value were known by example in the guidebooks. Then those digitized points were fed to an equation solver on the Mac that would take the input points and output an equation for that line that fit the example data across the range. Then we would code all equations for the tool nomogram and test outputs to make sure that it calculated exactly as the chart books specified. Then we would feed downhole log data and crosscheck for any calculation bugs, overflows, etc and make sure it all fit into a reasonable geological/geophysical situation.
I don't remember the name of the software used on the Mac. I would have to go out to the box and check for the disk. I still have the computer and other stuff including some dot matrix printouts of a lot of the code we used in debugging. Not sure why I kept all that.
I never made a nickel from all that though I know that it was used commercially after I went to grad school. It was fun though and helped launch my career in geophysics. Being a geophysicist in the late 80's who could code, identify bugs, run all the software and operating systems without someone needing to babysit them was a clear advantage.
Our process was pretty convoluted and involved the PC and a 128k Mac (upgraded to 512k later) with some Mac software that didn't exist in PC world at the time. We would digitize the nomogram curves or lines top to bottom and include any points where value were known by example in the guidebooks. Then those digitized points were fed to an equation solver on the Mac that would take the input points and output an equation for that line that fit the example data across the range. Then we would code all equations for the tool nomogram and test outputs to make sure that it calculated exactly as the chart books specified. Then we would feed downhole log data and crosscheck for any calculation bugs, overflows, etc and make sure it all fit into a reasonable geological/geophysical situation.
I don't remember the name of the software used on the Mac. I would have to go out to the box and check for the disk. I still have the computer and other stuff including some dot matrix printouts of a lot of the code we used in debugging. Not sure why I kept all that.
I never made a nickel from all that though I know that it was used commercially after I went to grad school. It was fun though and helped launch my career in geophysics. Being a geophysicist in the late 80's who could code, identify bugs, run all the software and operating systems without someone needing to babysit them was a clear advantage.