What is Hellschreiber.

Hellschreiber is a German name, meaning "bright writing", or "clear writing". Hellschreiber is anything but a new mode. It was first patented in 1929 which makes it the oldest machine generated data transmission mode used in amateur radio. To put this in perspective, SSB was not introduced to the amateur radio community until 1948! Like it's younger cousin RTTY, Hellschreiber was originally a land based method of transmitting information and was later adapted for radio transmission. Also like RTTY, this mode is experiencing a resurgence in popularity due to the recent development of computer software used in conjunction with a soundcard which has taken the place of cumbersome mechanical devices which were originally required to use this mode.