Meshing Gears

[FizMan]

I'm pretty sure there's a thread aboot this somewhere, but me being on a break at work, don't have time to sift through the site.

Anyhow, lots of talk aboot dogs in transmissions letting you 'shift-on-the-fly'. What are the problems when it comes to meshing two gears directly?

______
 |  |
=== |
 | ===
 |  |
______
 
shift to:
______ 
 |  |
======
 |  |
 |  |
______

I hope you get the picture; it's a top-down shot of a simple system pushing one gear to align with a second. (the === are the gears, the | are the axles, and the _____ is the housing)

And is shifting like this not possible on the fly? Didn't that team with the 4 speed automatic transmission do it on the fly? (forgot the team name)

If there's already a thread like this, you can point me in the direction of it too if you'd rather (don't want to waste your time writing a post if the information is there)

Thanks for your help.