Cloud-based computer applications are all around us and continue to expand and influence many aspects of our personal and professional lives. Digital, or computer-based machining (CAM) is no exception.
Although CAM and computer numerically controlled (CNC) technologies have been with us for several decades, cloud-based methods are relatively new, but evolving at a rapid pace.
The first NC machines were built in the 1940s and 1950s, based on existing tools that were modified with servomotors that moved tools or parts to follow points fed into the system on punched tape. These early servomechanisms were rapidly augmented with analog and digital computers, creating the modern CNC machine tools that revolutionized machining, and more recently, cloud-based processes.
