IBM 557 Alphabetic Interpreter

The IBM 557 Alphabetic Interpreter allowed holes in punched cards to be interpreted and the Hollerith punched card characters printed on any row or column, selected by a plugboard control panel. The machine was a synchronous system where brushes would glide over a hole in a punched card and contact a brass roller thereby setting up part of a character code. There are no 557's operating commercially in the world today.