FIELDATA (also written as Fieldata) was a pioneering computer project run by the US Army Signal Corps in the late 1950s that intended to create a single standard (as defined in MIL-STD-188A/B/C) for collecting and distributing battlefield information. In this respect it could be thought of as a generalization of the US Air Force's SAGE system that was being created at about the same time.
Unlike SAGE, FIELDATA was intended to be much larger in scope, allowing information to be gathered from any number of sources and forms. Much of the FIELDATA system was the specifications for the format the data would take, leading to a character set that would be a huge influence on ASCII a few years later. FIELDATA also specified the message formats and even the electrical standards for connecting FIELDATA-standard machines together.
Another part of the FIELDATA project was the design and construction of computers at several different scales, from data-input terminals at one end, to theatre-wide data processing centers at the other. Several FIELDATA-standard computers were built during the lifetime of the project, including the transportable MOBIDIC from Sylvania, and the BASICPAC and LOGICPAC from Philco. Another system, ARTOC, was intended to provide graphical output (in the form of photographic slides), but was never completed.
Because FIELDATA did not specify codes for interconnection and data transmission control, different systems (like "STANDARD FORM", "COMLOGNET Common language code", "SACCOMNET (465L) Control Code") used different control functions. Intercommunication between them was difficult.
FIELDATA is the original character set used internally in UNIVAC computers of the 1100 series, each six-bit character contained in six sequential bits of the 36-bit word of that computer. The direct successor to the UNIVAC 1100 is the Unisys 2200 series computers, which used FIELDATA (although ASCII is now also common with each character encoded in 1/4 of a word, or 9 bits). Because some of the FIELDATA characters are not represented in ASCII, the Unisys 2200 uses '^', '"' and '_' characters for codes 004oct, 076oct and 077oct respectively.
The FIELDATA project ran from 1956 until it was stopped during a reorganization in 1962.
FIELDATA characters Military Tag Bit (1)Indicator Bits (2)Detail Bits (4)Binary Bits (1+6)DecimalOctalGlyphNameCommentSupervisory code (tag bit 0) 00000000:0000000000Blank / Idle (IDL) 00000010:0000011001Control Upper Case (CUC) 00000100:0000102002Control Lower Case (CLC) 00000110:0000113003Control Tab (CHT) 00001000:0001004004Control Carriage Return (CCR) 00001010:0001015005Control Space (CSP) 00001100:0001106006aThe first two rows of the supervisory code are not used in all applications, only where "alphabetic supervisory information" is required. COMLOGNET omits them, while SACCOMNET includes additional control characters in place of the supervisory letters. 00001110:0001117007b 00010000:0010008010c 00010010:0010019011d 00010100:00101010012e 00010110:00101111013f 00011000:00110012014g 00011010:00110113015h 00011100:00111014016i 00011110:00111115017j 00100000:01000016020k 00100010:01000117021l 00100100:01001018022m 00100110:01001119023n 00101000:01010020024o 00101010:01010121025p 00101100:01011022026q 00101110:01011123027r 00110000:01100024030s 00110010:01100125031t 00110100:01101026032u 00110110:01101127033v 00111000:01110028034w 00111010:01110129035x 00111100:01111030036y 00111110:01111131037z 01000000:10000032040βDial 0 (D0)Graphical in COMLOGNET variant. 01000010:10000133041#Dial 1 (D1) 01000100:10001034042tDial 2 (D2) 01000110:10001135043Dial 3 (D3) 01001000:10010036044Dial 4 (D4) 01001010:10010137045@Dial 5 (D5)Graphical in COMLOGNET variant. 01001100:10011038046%Dial 6 (D6) 01001110:10011139047¢Dial 7 (D7) 01010000:10100040050Dial 8 (D8)BEL in COMLOGNET. 01010010:10100141051&Dial 9 (D9)Graphical in COMLOGNET variant. 01010100:10101042052ΣStart of Control Block (SCB, SOC) 01010110:10101143053≠Start of Block (SBK, SOB) 01011000:10110044054≢Spare, SOD 01011010:10110145055°Spare 01011100:10111046056Spare 01011110:10111147057Spare, Stop 01100000:11000048060Ready to Transmit (RTT) 01100010:11000149061Ready to Receive (RTR) 01100100:11001050062Not Ready to Receive (NRR) 01100110:11001151063End of Blockette (EBE, EOBK) 01101000:11010052064End of Block (EBK, EOB) 01101010:11010153065End of File (EOF) 01101100:11011054066End of Control Block (ECB, EOC) 01101110:11011155067Acknowledge Receipt (ACK, ACR) 01110000:11100056070Repeat Block (RPT, RBK) 01110010:11100157071SpareOrdered ISN, NISN, CWF, Spare in some variants. 01110100:11101058072Interpret Sign (INS, ISN) 01110110:11101159073Non-Interpret Sign (NIS, NISN) 01111000:11110060074Control Word Follows (CWF) 01111010:11110161075S.A.C. (SAC) 01111100:11111062076Special Character (SPC)ASCII ESC. 01111110:11111163077Delete (DEL)Primary code (tag bit 1) 10000001:00000064100Master Space (MS) 10000011:00000165101Upper Case (UC) 10000101:00001066102Lower Case (LC) 10000111:00001167103Tab (HT) 10001001:00010068104Carriage Return (CR) 10001011:00010169105Blank / Space (SP) 10001101:00011070106A 10001111:00011171107B 10010001:00100072110C 10010011:00100173111D 10010101:00101074112E 10010111:00101175113F 10011001:00110076114G 10011011:00110177115H 10011101:00111078116I 10011111:00111179117J 10100001:01000080120K 10100011:01000181121L 10100101:01001082122M 10100111:01001183123N 10101001:01010084124O 10101011:01010185125P 10101101:01011086126Q 10101111:01011187127R 10110001:01100088130S 10110011:01100189131T 10110101:01101090132U 10110111:01101191133V 10111001:01110092134W 10111011:01110193135X 10111101:01111094136Y 10111111:01111195137Z 11000001:10000096140) 11000011:10000197141- 11000101:10001098142+ 11000111:10001199143< 11001001:100100100144= 11001011:100101101145> 11001101:100110102146_& in UNIVAC. 11001111:100111103147$ 11010001:101000104150* 11010011:101001105151( 11010101:101010106152"% in UNIVAC. 11010111:101011107153: 11011001:101100108154? 11011011:101101109155! 11011101:101110110156, 11011111:101111111157Stop (ST) 11100001:1100001121600 11100011:1100011131611 11100101:1100101141622 11100111:1100111151633 11101001:1101001161644 11101011:1101011171655 11101101:1101101181666 11101111:1101111191677 11110001:1110001201708 11110011:1110011211719 11110101:111010122172' 11110111:111011123173; 11111001:111100124174/ 11111011:111101125175. 11111101:111110126176Special Character (SPEC) 11111111:111111127177Backspace (BS)
UNIVAC The code version used on the UNIVAC was based on the second half (primary code) of the military version with some changes.
Indicator Bits (2)Detail Bits (4)Binary Bits (6)DecimalOctalGlyphNameComments 00 0000 000000000@Sometimes switched with Δ 00 0001 000001101[ 00 0010 000010202] 00 0011 000011303#Line Feed (LF) on 1107 and 1108 00 0100 000100404ΔDeltaCarriage Return (CR) on 1107 and 1108 00 0101 000101505Blank / Space (SP) 00 0110 000110606A 00 0111 000111707B 00 1000 001000810C 00 1001 001001911D 00 1010 0010101012E 00 1011 0010111113F 00 1100 0011001214G 00 1101 0011011315H 00 1110 0011101416I 00 1111 0011111517J 01 0000 0100001620K 01 0001 0100011721L 01 0010 0100101822M 01 0011 0100111923N 01 0100 0101002024O 01 0101 0101012125P 01 0110 0101102226Q 01 0111 0101112327R 01 1000 0110002430S 01 1001 0110012531T 01 1010 0110102632U 01 1011 0110112733V 01 1100 0111002834W 01 1101 0111012935X 01 1110 0111103036Y 01 1111 0111113137Z 10 0000 1000003240) 10 0001 1000013341- 10 0010 1000103442+ 10 0011 1000113543< 10 0100 1001003644= 10 0101 1001013745> 10 0110 1001103846&Changed from _ in military version. 10 0111 1001113947$ 10 1000 1010004050* 10 1001 1010014151( 10 1010 1010104252%Changed from " in military version. 10 1011 1010114353: 10 1100 1011004454? 10 1101 1011014555! 10 1110 1011104656, 10 1111 1011114757\Stop sign (🛑︎) on 1107 and 1108 11 0000 11000048600 11 0001 11000149611 11 0010 11001050622 11 0011 11001151633 11 0100 11010052644 11 0101 11010153655 11 0110 11011054666 11 0111 11011155677 11 1000 11100056708 11 1001 11100157719 11 1010 1110105872' 11 1011 1110115973; 11 1100 1111006074/ 11 1101 1111016175. 11 1110 1111106276⌑Lozenge 11 1111 1111116377≠Not EqualIdle character (IDLE) on some models
Character map
Military version The following table is representative of a reference version of the military set, as described in . Various other variants exist, with in some cases dramatic differences in the supervisory code (the first four rows 0–3). The letters in the first two rows are intended for use in "alphabetic supervisory information".
UNIVAC version The code version used on the UNIVAC was based on the second half (6-bit primary code) of the military version with some changes.
Footnotes
References and further reading