Abstract: The invention relates to a method for the independent control of individual or a group of fluorescent lamps of a lighting system operated by the a.c. supply system with the main functions of rapid start, brightness control (dimming), extinction and storage of an operating state for switching on the system after it has been switched off. A feature of the invention resides in the possibility of converting existing conventional lighting systems without additional installation costs merely by exchanging the respective conventional starter for a control circuit according to the invention and by exchanging the conventional light switch for transducers according to the invention. To achieve this, a control element instead of the known starter is connected into the heating circuit for a lamp formed from a series circuit of a fluorescent tube with a ballast device.

Abstract: A display surface for presenting information in tactile form by means of a grid-shaped array of tactile elements. It can be selectively caused to project into the space above the display surface by using lifting elements. According to the invention, there are a number of line slides (8) corresponding to the number of lines of tactile dots, and a number of column slides (3) corresponding to the number of columns of tactile dots. On the line slides a part (9) is allocated to each lifting element (7) in such a way that the lifting element is fixed in the plane of the line, although it is movable in the plane of the column. Similarly on the column slides a part (4) is associated with each lifting element to shift the latter in the plane of the column.