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stranger
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stranger
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Speaking of the envelopes, does anyone know where "pushing the envelope" comes from?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I was thinking of the same question, hat. I could be way off base  here, but I think it's a flying term, especially from high speed fighter pilots, talking about getting to the front end of the envelope of air that is created when one approaches Mach 1.
formerly known as etaoin...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Meaning of "push the envelope"
Go to the limits of known performance.
Origin
Originated with aeroplane industry where the limits of a plane's performance
were marked on a two-dimensional graph. The envelope is the area of the graph
that indicates safe usage. In use since the late 1970s.
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Carpal Tunnel
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i also think it to be a WWII era jet test word.
Jets made there appearance in WWII, and after the war, there were many test about there capabilities. these were plotted, (what speeds could they attain at what altitude, what was engine stall speed, etc., and these paramiters were called the envelope (why?) and when test pilots attempted to do thing the planes hadn't been designed to do, (ie, breaking the sound barrier) they were pushing the envelope. (first used extensively in print in "the right stuff"--authors name, is gone for the moment, same guy who wrote bonfire of the vanities, and electric kool ade something.. tom..??)
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Carpal Tunnel
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well, I was close!  though it doesn't necessarily explain the use of the word, "envelope". Tom Clancy?
formerly known as etaoin...
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no, not tom clancy (leather jackets, aviator glasses) but the one in the natty double breasted white suits.. (from memory of photo's on book jackets.) and yet i still can't remember his name!
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TEd
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thanks, TEd! never read either, but Clancy came to mind, thought I'd offer it...
formerly known as etaoin...
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thanks TEd, that's the guy--
and it works out right for Dr bill's post, first used after WWII, by test pilots, entered the common language in the early 70's, with the publication of the book, The Right Stuff --especially since some chapters of the book first appeared as articles in places like the New Yorker.. so the expression was being used before the book was actually published.
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stranger
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I was teaching amplitude modulation in class today and the professor who is sitting in my class to teach it next semester came to me at the end and said "I bet this is where pushing the envelope comes from" I said, I will ask. Envelope is the message signal which is off set by a constant value to avoid synchronization at the receiver. If the off-set is too much, the message signal (the envelope) is pushed up too high and gets distorted. Since AM radio comes before WWII, maybe they borrowed the term.
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