EN
The paper focused on the technical development issues and emphasized the actual use of technical means in contemporary times, including – among others – tools and devices in the era of automation and electronics, and also robotics in the future. In historical time, the following groups of technical means should be mentioned in turn: 1) instruments and tools, as well as devices made from natural elements, especially of stone and wood; 2) instruments, tools and devices made mostly of metal, as well as equipment made – depending on needs – from different materials, including the ones made of glass; 1) technical means which boasted distinguished features of mechanisms (e. g. drawbridges) or even automatic machines (e. g. clocks and watches); 4) emergence of technical and technological conditions for the production of machines and construction of factories in the pre-industrial manufacture when the division of production deepened, broadened and fell into activities equivalent to technical and technological operations which initiated technical revolution; 5) implementation of assembly lines in big H. Ford car manufacturing plants which were the germs of production automatic machines initiating the scientific and technical revolution; 6) electronic devices, especially TV-sets and computers; 7) remote controlling of space objects and production processes; 8) the use of the internet for acquiring information and for communication; 9) the use of robots combining the latest technique and electronics, and working thanks to perfectly used software, which are a manifestation of great technical and technological progress, and have great perspectives for the future. Taking into account the above, the author distinguished nine stages of technical development mainly: 1) the stage of (conventionally speaking) primitive technique; 2) the stage of mainly stone and wood tools; 3) the stage of metal tools made in smelting processes; 4) the stage of mechanization due to the extensive use of machines; 5) the stage of automation as a result of extensive use of automatic machines; 6) the stage of electronics, including mainly the common use of a higher and higher generation of computers; 7) the stage of production remote controlled technique; 8) the stage of common internet domination; 9) and the future stage of robots, including mainly production robots.