Talk:Sensor

Sound Sensors

Perhaps a note should be added that sound sensors are pressure change activated. The inclusion here of seismic sensor has me scratching my head. SNR would be an issue for any device I can envision. Does the author mean 'seismic activity detector' -- which I understand is a microphone set atop a volcano, and is of limited quantitative utility? Great article overall!!! P.S. I'm removing from most wanted list... this is clearly no longer a stub! Fabartus 02:26, 30 May 2005 (UTC)

State of page

Added cleanup notice. Page still needs a lot of organising/tidying.--Light current 23:51, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

explain, please. Kaverin — Preceding undated comment added 09:07, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

Proposed merger

Proposed merging in Detector, at least the parts pertaining to the general sense of the word. Please discuss at Talk:Detector. -- The Photon 05:19, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Two stages

sensor basically consists of two stages: transduction and transformation.the transduction stage may be called as detection or the detector stage — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.41.33.7 (talk) 07:24, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

See comment in definition below. A sensor in not a transducer. Sensor and detector are not the same. The output of a detector is "yes" or "no", in response to a measured property. The output of a sensor is proportional to the magnitude of the measured property. --Rabbiz (talk) 19:20, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Definition

This article does not have a definition of sensors, just proceeds straight to the Overview. Can someone pop it in there please? Leemorrison 14:04, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Also, the article says "A sensor is a type of transducer", but the transducer article has a list of types of transducers and sensor is not in that list. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.240.179.100 (talk) 11:21, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

A sensor is not a transducer. (I worked 20 years in this field). It is the other way around. A sensor produces a raw output which is not yet calibrated or corrected for stray errors. A transducer is a sensor to which electronic circuitry is added to produce a calibrated readable signal. --Rabbiz (talk) 19:15, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

The first sentence is, today, an adequate definition. [Though, by using 'device' and by using 'observer' and 'instrument', it seems to exclude neurons: certainly an important kind of sensor.] Joaquin 21 December '08

[I don't agree with Rabbiz' argument, but he is certainly correct: a sensor is not a transducer; not if we accept this article's understanding of 'transducer'.]

Some sensors are not, as transducer is defined in this article, transducers. The article gives us an example in its second sentence: a mercury thermometer.

The article says "Because sensors are a type of transducer, they change one form of energy into another."

But a mercury thermometer does not change one form of energy into another. The thermometer comes to the temperature of its environment by absorbing thermal energy from the environment or releasing thermal energy to the environment. The "form" of that energy does not change.

There are only three changes: the environment and the thermometer come to the same temperature; the volume of the mercury changes; as a result of the volume change, the length of the tube that contains mercury changes. None of these is a change in the "form" of the energy present from one "form" to another.

But then, the article is also wrong about what a transducer is.

A transducer is "any device by which variations in one physical quantity (e.g. pressure, brightness) are quantitatively converted into variations in another (e.g. voltage, position). [OED II]"

So, a thermometer is a transducer: it is a device by which variations in one physical quantity (temperature) are quantitatively converted into variations in another (length).

[The examples in the first paragraph of the article (thermometer, thermocouple) and the statements about those examples are correct.]

This article needs serious contributions: from someone with a solid understanding of the concept and related concepts; from a good copy editor. --Joaquin 21 December '08

Anybody want to point out some relevant sources that give definitions of both sensor and transducer, so we can compare? Otherwise, why discuss it? Dicklyon (talk) 23:06, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

"A sensor is a device which receives and responds to a signal when touched." - I don't believe magnetic sensors are touched, at least not physically. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.129.150.234 (talk) 13:41, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Good Rishi Lin (talk) 14:31, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Proximity sensors

Overall quality of the article is O.K. but it doesn't discuss Proximity sensors. Perhaps these should be added. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.241.108.122 (talk) 15:31, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Major Deletions from Chemical Sensors

I removed a lot of content from the chemical sensor section because it didn't name any actual sensors; it just made vague implications that chemical sensors were used in application A and application B.

I think the article is better if it has the same format as the electrical and mechanical sensors. I.e. this article should be a large index of sensors and if readers want details they can go to the specific sensors.

I think general information that applies to most or many sensors is fine but not loads of details about specific sensors. That makes the article unwieldy.

Clan-destine 20:40, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

May 9th 2008 restoration to 20 April 2008

Massive vandalism deletion was incorrectly edited, causing significant loss of material. Restored and updated the one valid edit edit. Please monitor articles you watch for deletionist vandalism by back-comparing to your last edit. Thanks, Leonard G. (talk) 01:07, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

biometric

This was in the intro:

In biometrics, electrical capacitance sensors from leading manufacturers, such as AuthenTec, scan the minute radio frequency (RF) pattern beneath the live skin of a finger pad. The pattern creates a unique algorithm to identify the user. Many popular laptops and keyboards have the RF strip sensors.

This seems like a very specific example, but I'm not sure of what (I considered putting it under electromagnetic or biometric in types but didn't think it quite fit). Seems like a bit of an advertisement with a company name in it. I just took it out and moved it here, we can move it back if we clean it up and figureout where it goes. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RJFJR (talk • contribs) 17:07, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

sensors according to computing

I think a new section should be added to the page of sensor which is the type of sensors. According to context awareness related to computer science there are three types of sensors:

• Physical Sensors: or hardware sensors, nowadays, many hardware sensors are available.
• Virtual Sensors: it is another way of capturing data through software services or applications. It is possible to determine the location of the student in the university not only through hardware sensor (GPS), but also through his/her logging in/out processes.
• Logical Sensors: this type of sensors combines the physical and virtual sensors to solve bigger problems.

edited by use Mohammed —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mhd mar85 (talk • contribs) 21:40, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Bionic sensors

Can the bionic sonsors (IR sensor, stretch sensor) developed by Dedy Wicaksono (TU Delft) be mentioned ? http://dedywicaksono.wordpress.com/2008/10/21/my-phd-research/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.245.64.190 (talk) 11:13, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

response time

I suggest a brief explanation of response time. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 144.118.94.175 (talk) 22:49, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Vandalism on this talk page

Translation of the Japanese comments on this article make it clear that they are spam/ads/vandalism. I can't find a template to put on this page so I'm going to Be Bold and remove them. --Iamjp180 (talk) 20:51, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

I forgot to include this link: Google Translation of this page --Iamjp180 (talk) 20:52, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Integration time

We need to have integration time somewhere and the concept is fairly generic so add the section here or in signal processing? Hcobb (talk) 22:07, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Clarify

Please clarify the difference between resolution and sensitivity.--عبد المؤمن (talk) 17:20, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

Thermocouple rig as example image?

This is a very broad topic, and I don't think that the thermocouple photograph illustrates the subject well (the measurement rig is also quite messy overall). I suggest that we either remove that image, or use a "multiple image" template with a diverse range of examples. How about it? Anonimski (talk) 23:01, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Major editing

Dear sensor editors,

I started reviewing the article and I'll be working on it to add more reference and clean up a bit. Join me if you feel like. The main references will the the VIM: International vocabulary of metrology and the book Sensors and Signal Conditioning.

happy editing let me know if you would suggest a certain table of contents to be filled out! keep sensing,

missperovaz 04:35, 17 August 2014 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Missperovaz (talk • contribs)

Good news - the article does need a lot of attention! I've tweaked a few bits in the lead. The IVM phrasing bothered me; I love those beautifully coherent and unambiguous vocabulary standards, where everything interlocks beautifully and translates into many languages - but you need a good grasp of the whole to understand the pieces. So I checked a couple of dictionaries (one general, one science-and-technology) and created another definition that owes a bit to each of them. See what you think. NebY (talk) 20:39, 17 August 2014 (UTC)