I DIGITAL COMPUT ERTappootlnustr R The purpose of th Isno Iotter is to provide afedIum for the Interchange among Interested persons of Information con- IL4 11r k Aoi i cerning recent developments In vsrlous digital computer 6atrltutIon Is Ito uiproloste to overo-- i SOFFICE OF NAVAL RESEARCtN Vol 19 No 4 agencies contractors and contributors A I • MATINIMATICAL SCIENCES DIVISION Gordon P Goldstein Editor Laura A Repass Editorial Assistant Barbara J Walker Editorial Assistant October 1967 D D OT61S CONTENTS EDITORIAL POLICY NOTICES 1 Editorial- - 2 Contributions 3 Circulation - I COMPUTERS AND DATA PROCESSORS NORTH AMERICA 1 General Electric GE-420 and GE-4 -T'i-WShring Systems New York N Y 10022 2 Philco-Ford Corporation Advanced AUTODIN System Philadelphia Pennsylvania 19134 2 4 COMPUTING CENTERS 1 Georgia Institute of Technology Rich Electronic Computer Center New 1108 Univac Computer System Ath inta Georgia 30332 2 University of Hawail IBM 360 50 Honolulu Hawaii 96822 3 U S Fleet Numerical Weather Facility Environmental Support for the Fleet Monterey Calif 93940 11 II 12 COMPUTERS AND CENTERS OVERSEAS 1 English Electric-Leo- arconi Computers Ltd Combined Industry University Government Computer Software London SWI England 2 International Computers and Tabulators Limited Computerized Crime Prevention London SWI5 England 3 The Marconi Company Limited European Datel System Chelmsford Essex England 4 Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology Meteorology Computer Use Melbourne Australia 16 17 18 20 MISCELLANEOUS 1 University of California Project GENIE Berkeley Calif 94720 2 Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory Inc Shipboard Computer Control Programs Buffalo N Y 14221 3 Dade County Public Safety Department Computerized Crime Information Miami Florida 33132 4 Hennepin County Computerized Tax Records Minneapolis Minnesota 55415 5 University of Illinois Coordinated Science Laboratory PLATO Urbana Illinois 61801 6 National Bureau of Standards Classification and Indexing at the Office of Standard Reference Data Washington D C 20234 7 National Bureau of Standards General-Purpose Code System for Scientific Documents Washington D C 20234 8 Naval Training Device Center Research Tool Digital Computer Facility Orlando Florida 32813 9 Navy Aviation Supply Office Advanced Inventory Control Philadelphia Pa 10 Navy Pacific Missile Range Centralized Data Processing Point Mugu Calif 93041 11 University of Southern California Mobile Medical Check-ups Los Angeles Calif 90007 Approved by The Under Secretary of the Navy 25 September 1961 Rvpr f uc d by th C LE A RI NG HOU SE i t-deral Sciuntific lechncfl InIurniation Springfiuld Va 22151 22 23 24 25 26 33 35 36 37 39 39 NAVSO P-645 I Editorial Policy Notices EDITORIAL The Digital Computer Newsletter although a Department of the Navy publication Is not restricted to the publication of Navy-originated material The Office of Naval Research welcomes contributions to the Newsletter from any source The Newsletter is subjected to certain limitations in size which prevent publishing all the material received Contributed items which are not printed are kept on file and are made available to interested personnel within the Government DCN is published quarterly January April July and October Material for specific issues must be received by the editor at least three months in advance It is to be noted that the publication of information pertaining to commercial products does not In any way imply Navy approval of those products nor does it mean that Navy vouches for the accuracy of the statements made by the various contributors The information contained herein is to be considered only as being representative of the state-ofthe-art and not as the sole product or technique available CONTRIBUTIONS The Office of Naval Research welcomes contributions to the Newsletter from any source Your contributions will provide assistance in improving the contents of the publication thereby making it an even better medium for the exchange of information between government laboratories academic institutions and industry It is hoped that the readers will continue to participate in transmitting technical material and suggestions to the editor for future issues Material for specific issueR must be received by the editor at least three months in advance It is often impossible for the editor because of limited time and personnel to acknowledge Individually all material received CIRCULATION The Newsletter is distributed without charge to interested military and government agencir to contractors for the Federal Government and to contributors of material for publication Requests to receive the Newsletter regularly should be submitted to the editor Contractors of the Federal Government should reference applicable contracts in their requests All communications pertaining to the Newsletter should be addressed to GORDON D GOLDSTEIN Editor Digital Computer Newsletter Informations Systems Branch Office of Naval Research Washington D C 20360 I Computers and Data Processors North America GE-4211 and GE-400 Time Sharing System New 1 04 New The first in a new family of General Electric time-sharing ernmputers was announced in June by Vern S Cooper manager of the General Electric Information Systems Marketing Operation 'opth1002 and each terminal usually can serve the needs of three or four individuals A password technique incorporated into the new time-sharing system allows confidential data to be protected against unauthorized or accidental disclosure Only those authorized to use the appropriate password are able to gain access to any confidential information contained in the permanent file The GE-420 time-sharing system employs many of the features of GE's well- established and highly successful GE-265 time-sharing systemns plus many improvements For example the new systen has the ability to permit two programs to reside in core providing multiprogramming in a time-sharing environment The GE-420 uses an extended form of the BASIC computer language first developed by Dartmouth College and used on the GE-265 system Present time-sharing users can move up to the medium-scale GE-420 easily and without retraining GE's new medium-scale time-sharing system which leases for approximately $17 000 a month and sells for $760 000 is capable of handling 30 users at one Larger members of the family will be introduced later BASIC uses familiar English words as a means of communication with the computer and can be learned by persons totally unfamiliar with computer programming in as little as I hour The extended BASIC used on the GE-420 includes refinements which make it capable of executing more complex problems than ever before Time-sharing is a technique which permits many people to use a single computer at the same time It increases the usefulness of the computer by making it available to more users including those who are not situated near the computer site and those who are unfamiliar with the technical aspects of computers or computer programming For the scientific engineering user FORTRAN will be available for the GE-420 during the first quarter of 1968 Businesses which have experienced the greatest benefit from time-sharing to date are banks large industrial firms and engineeringand scientific-oriented firms Hardware requirements for the GE-420 include a 32K GE-415 central processor a 16K DATANET-30 communications processor and a DSU-204 disc storage unit The GE-420 can be used as a powerful batch processing system for business data processing and scientific engineering applications when not being utilized for time-sharing This means that the system when not dedicated to timesharing can handle overloads from other data processing systems First deliveries of the GE-420 will be made in the last quarter of 1967 Normal delivery is one year GE-420 TIME-SHARING SYSTEM The GE-420 time-sharing system will handle 30 communications lines concurrently As many as 300 people can use the GE-420 in normal time-sharing operations experience has shown that this number of communication lines normally can serve more than 100 remote terminals Hardware Requirements 2 GE-415 central processor 32K DATANET-30 communications processor 16K DSU-204 disc storage unit 1• 1_her GE-420 TIME-SHARING SYSTEM Cont Peripherals Magnetic Tape Units Languages Access Time Card Reader 900 cpm Card Punch 100 300 epni Printer 1200 ipm 17 microseconds Floating Point Dvd 30 microseconds Disc Storage Capacity 18-24M Price Typical System General Electric's family of GE-400 computers includes three systems the GE-415 GE-425 and GE-435 Designed by one of the world's largest users of computer systems the three are compatible in programming periphdata erals rad hardware They handle business processing scientific engineering computations and data communications assignments with equal GE-400 SERIES OF MEDIUMSCALE COMPUTERS facility The GE-400 systems have benefited from users'promptly needs in understanding GE's intimate economy ability toofexpand operating Specifications Common to GE- 415 GE-425 and G-k-435 Computers Data Manipulation and Arithmetic Instruction Format Addressing Internal Data Storage Number of Instructions Basic Total Single- and Double-Address Addresses per Instruction 12 FORTRAN COBOL Compiler SIMCON DAPS Macro Asscmbly Compiler Extended Operating System Magnetic Tapes Double Precision Floating Point Report Program Generator Sort Merge Generator Operating System Input Output System Simultaneous Media Conversion Service Routines $16 944 monthly lease $760 000 purchase Electronics Decinmal Alphanumeric Character Word Length Characters per Word Memory Type 6 Program Packages for All Three Computer Tystems 1 5 microseconds per character Floating Point Add Tnde4 Multiple Read Write Compute Any Word Indexing Indirect Addressing Scatter Read Gather Write Relocatable Accumulator Extended BASIC FORTRAN first quarter 1968 32K F'ned Features Common to All Thr e Computer Systems Tape Controller 2 models available Tape Handlers 12 models from 200 556 to 200 556 800 BPI intensity Memory Size Words nf Words Maximum Number of T Channels Solid State to keep pace with growing work loads and the desirability of amortizing programming costs over as long a period of time as possible 6 bits 24 bits and parity 4 Coincident Current Core Users of GE-40O systems represent a cross section of business industry and governmoent Decimal or Binary 24 Bits Binary 15 Bits Binary Decimal BCD or Binary Built for ease of upgrading and expansion the GE-400's have been improved periodically in operation speed and memory capacity in line with the latest advances in computing technology Development of new software and systems packages continues constantly 70 For example memory speeds- the time it takes to obtain data from the computer's memory-- have been improved from 2 3 to 1 45 200 1 or 2 3 microseconds in the GE-415 and from 1 28 microseconds to nanoseconds in the 425 Thp larwaa 975 rnmArnr nf thp naripm GEthp operation and long-distance communications It provided many of the advanced capabilities usu-11 y r nlbea • •• GE-435 has a memory speed of 680 nanoseconds Another new application system for the GF-400's was also recently Pnnounced Scientific Inventory Management and Control SIMCON was introduced last month It provides the user with a means to automate inventory management and control and was drawn from the inventory control experience of some 100 different General Electric product businesses covering a wide range of sizes and complexity The new system enables many businesses to justify the cost of a computer installation solely on the basis of inventory savings and the resulting improvements in profits A new Extended Operating System for Ma'jnetic Tapes EOS MT is currently being announced and already has helped one large national bank to increase its GE-415 throughput by 25 percent Last April it was announced that the core memory capacity of the GE-425 and GE-435 computers was increased from a maximum of 32 000 words to 131 000 words 524 000 characters in increments of 16 000 words When a program is developed for the lowercapacity processor of any one of these computers It may be used on any system with a higher capacity Thus programming investment may be charged against future growth as well as today's needs Recently a DireLt Access Programming System DAPS was announced for the GE-400's It brought to users a medium-scale computers the ability to handle multiprogramming remote Advanced AUTODIN System P'hilade'lphia Penw yhvania I'll 71 Philco-Ford Corporation has unveiled a full-scale operating prototype of the automatic digital message centers the company will build around the Free World for the Department of Defense tions Command under the management of the Defense Communications Agency in the Department of Defense Philco-Ford is furnishing the centers under a prime contract totaling more than $44 million with the Army Electronics Command at Ft Monmouth N J The operating prototype known as the AUTODIN Pilot Production Model was demonstrated early in 1967 at the Philco- Ford plant It contains six Philco Model 102 computers and peripheral equipment deployed in three operational roums AUTODIN is one of several programs for which procurement management is being handled by the Universal Integrated Communications Strategic Communications UNICOM STARCOM Project Manager's Office an element of the Army Materiel Command also at Ft Monmouth AUTODIN is an acronym for Automatic Digital Network A digital network transmits printed messages as opposed to an Automatic Voice Network AUTOVON which transmits the spoken woid much as in telephonic communications Mr Hockeimer said the AUTODIN system represents the combining of the communications and computer technologies Henry E Hockeimer a Philco- Ford vice president and General Manager of the company's Communications Electronics Division which is building the AUTODIN centers said the Overseas AUTODLN notwork will be among the largest and most sophisticated communications systems in the world This represents far more than would just the completion of another contract It marks the beginning of a new era-- digital communications switching making full use of computers for communications We gained substantial operational experience in both hardware and software from a communications switch which we installed for the Ford Motor Company The overseas AUTODIN network is being implemented by the Army Strategic Commun ca- 4 I That switch which we turned over to Ford last year is processing over 26 000 messages every day from communications centers In the U S and abroad carded in favor of a systems effectiveness concept required by the government The new concept recognizes that a center does not fall completely but rather operates in a degraded condition in the event of certain subsystem failures This synthesis between computer technology and the communications art could result in a technological revolution New techniques and new equipment are being made available almost daily Four critical performance factors were specified in arriving at the AUTODIN systems effectiveness requirement input and output capacities line service availability and message processing time Performance levels were specified for each category Philco-Ford was required to demonstrate that its centers would achieve those levels and maintain that performance with specified statistical probabilities Philco-Ford Corporation through the Communications Electronics Division is clearly staking out a leadership position in this field of real-time digital communications switching We intend to invest whatever time talent and money are necessary in the months and years ahead to broaden and strengthen our leadership position For each performance parameter there is one requirement for an expected or average value and another requirement for a limit or at any time value with an associated probability The Pilot Production Model demonstration was conducted by Lloyd W Cali director of Communications Switching and Data Systems for the C E Division and Richard R Reaser AUTODIN program manager under Call For example the message switch in a 200line center is required to be capable of handling an input of 57 600 bits per second at a sustained rate with a peak of 70 000 bits per second for at least 12 seconds At any time the probability of the switch's limiting the inpat capacity to less than 10 000 data bits per second is limited to one in 100 000 AUTODIN centers already are being installed in The Philippines Germany and England A training center is under construction at Ft Monmouth New Jersey Other overseas centers will be installed in Okinawa Japan Guam Alaska and at three sites in the Far Ea t Two additional sites have yet to be selected A fully equipped 200-line center has to have an expected sustained output of at least 86 400 data bits per second At any time the probability of the center's limiting the output capacity to less than 15 000 data bits per second cannot be greater than one in 100 000 Eight of the overseas AUTODIN centers will service 200 duplex communications lines Four of the centers will service 100 duplex lines The larger centers each will require six Philco Model 102 large-scale high-speed cornputers while the smaller centers typically will require four Model 102 computers The expected percentage of terminated circuits capable of being served by a center must be at least 98 The probability of the switch's not being capable of serving at least 85 percent of all the terminated circuits at any given time cannot exceed one In 10 000 One of the ways by which Philco- Ford assured center reliability and continuity of per- A typical 200-line center will be capable of accepting 18 000 messages averaging about 2 haracters per hour and forwarding them t -'equired destinations formance lies in a unique function of the program The program automatically detects failure of a message switch subsystem switches the failed subsystem off-line switches a replacement subsystem on-line resumes message processing without losing or garbling any messages and notifies the operator of the failure All of this takes place in from two to twenty seconds depending on the nature of the failure and the subsystem involved This switching of message switch subsystems is accomplished by means of a configuration switching array The Philippines center is scheduled to be first to come on-stream in the spring of 1967 All of the additional centers are scheduled to be operational within 18 months The magnitude of hardware and complexity of operation within an Automatic Digital Message Switching Center made it necessary for PhilcoFord Corporation to implement a new concept for evaluating switching center reliability The traditional system mean time between failure and mean down time had to be dis- S I the mcpsage processor to interconnect any subsystem with any other appropriate subsystem And to isolmte n subsystem from the on- line system Preventive and corrective maintenance can be performed on equipment off-line witih no adverse effect on the operation of the center This functional interchangerbility permits continuous operation even in the event of subsystem failure without 100 percent hardware redundancy The functional redundancy made possible by the configuration switching array permitted Philco-Ford to meet systems effectiveness requirements and at the same time achieve a considerable cost saving to the government The Automatic Digital Network is a direct outgrowth of federal action to integrate the communleatwios of all the departments and agencies of the government The goal was to reduce costs increase efficiency and better serve each department's needs At that time multiple leased communications covered the samw paths and routes each used by different departments -r agencies Often these were being used only a fraction of leased time In addition government-owned communications also covered the same paths These individual department networks each used methods and procedures which were not always compatible with the others There was a definite need for integration ship-to-shore communications of the Navy and the air-to-ground communications of the Air Force The De ense Communications Agency is the manager of DCS even though each element making up the DCS may be operated by one of the military departments The DCA has set up a management system for control of these networks which depends upon reports from individual stations in the DCS The DCS is made up of about 160 networks A network Is defined as a group of circuits interconnecting stations to fulfill a purpose or mission common to these stations The official definition of the term network is a group of stations capable of intercommunication not necessarily on the same channel For illustration purposes DCS networks fall into two main categories general purpose and special purpose The general purpose network is often termed a common- user network in the military The term commonuser means that any military member who has an official need may send a message over this network The DCA is attempting to consolidate networks which have dedicated circuits into two networks to improve efficiency and still provide the equivalent la speed of service AUTOVON for analog communications and AUTODIN for record communications The AUTOVON is an Automatic Voice Network that serves DCS users with direct long distance dialing capabilities Like AU''ODIN the network Is to provide voice service to all posts camps stations and bases of the military services and other governmental agencies At present the AUTOVON network switches exist only in tho United States The White House designated all the government-owned and leased communications as the National Communications System NCS and designated the Secretary of Deiense as the executive agent of the NCS The Secretary of Defense designated the Chief of the Defense Communication Agency DCA as the manager of the NCS The manager and representatives from each department and agency which operate substantial amounts of communications were to work out integration problems The second type the special purpose network is designed for a specific mission or purpose These networks may be further categorized as functional networks or command and control networks By far the largest amotrt of communications owned or leased by the Government are under the Department of Defense The long haul point-to-point communications of the three military departments Army Navy and Air Force whether owned or leased are known as the Defense Communications System DCS The The DOD Automatic Digital Network designated by the acronym AUTODIN is one of many networks which make up the Defense Communications System The AUTODIN is a DCS general purpose common-user network designed to relay record printed traffic for the military services The functional networks do not follow comnmand lines but serve the needs of all major commands or their subdivisions for a specific function For instance the Air Operations Network AIROPNET of the Air Force handles messages pertaining to aircraft movements 6 I I The stations of AUTODIN are divided into two functional categories th-j tributary station and the relay or switching station The tribuLary stations greatly outnumber the relay or switching stations in the network They will number about 4000 in AUTODIN They directly serve users subsciibers customers They perform a message acceptant e and delivery A D function for the users Nearly every United States military camp p ost station or base throughout the Free World has a tributary station The overriding responsibility of the switch is to maintain mecsage security accountability and integrity The tributary generally receives handdelivered messages in handwritten typewritten printed teletype or card froJm originators of messages usually on the same camp post stalion or base They can also be received in magnetic tape or paper tape form but these are presently uncommon The messages can also be delivered to the tributary station over a local circuit between the tribut ry terminal and another location in the same local area The messages received at the tributary A D function from originators contain a mail type addressee for each addresser a designation as to precedence security classification and a text or body o athe ecmessagei Each ADMSC is composed for four major elements the communications element the ADMS element the unlnterrul ed power supply element and the programming element The AUTODIN switches serve the tributaries under the operational control and management of the Defense Communications Agency The Philco-Ford contract is to provide AUTODIN switches in 12 overseas areas plus a train- The Automatic Digital Message Switch is the heart uf the center It is composed of e'ectronic digital equipment employing primarily solid state components for receiving processing and transmitting on a store-and-forward ing facility at Ft Monmouth New Jersey An basis various forms of printed communications AUTODIN switch location is called an Automatic Digital Message Switching Center ADMSC traffic The store-and-forward message switching is accomplished by the Automatic Digital Message Switch In store-and-forward message switching any input message on any circuit when properly formatted will be accepted processed and distributed to the designated addresses as soon as output circuits are available The communications element includes the technical control facilities and its related funetions of station timing and signalling including their distribution the line equipment which provides the Interface between the ADMSC and other centers or trlbutaries and the DC battery distribution It is the communications subsystern which provides an automatic interface with thesome AUTOVON to establish circuitAUTODIN connections to tributaries and to other stations The ADMSC is comprised of a technical control facility power generating and distribution equipment timing source and distribution modems cryptographic and cryptoancillary equipment maintenince facilities an automatic digital message switch ADMS the building primary and emergency power and environmental equipment It performs the basic functions of message processing and switching The basic module of the ADMS is a message processor Philco Model 102 Processor which with its associated buffers and scanners performs its functions of message handling generation and display of status error analysis and automatic reconfiguration of equipments in response to equipment malfunctions Functionally the ADMSC is composed of an aggregation of communications equipment data The basic function of the ADMS is to accept process store and deliver record message traffic containing heading text and ending processing equipment monitoring testing patching and control equipment and consoles and support equipment and personnel in standard formats performing code modulalion rate and format conversion as required In addition the ADMS performs various bookkeeping and administrative functions to assure protection and security of message traffic and to provide operations and performance data for management evaluatlon The primary function of the ADMSC is to provide store-and-forward message switching It will handle both encLypted and unencrypted message traffic The ADMSC will provide necessary monitoring supervision and control required to maintain continuous service The programming of course is the software necessary to carry on message processing 7 I I provide alarms and indications to humans reconfigure the system automatically and provide tatus ieports These input or output lines may connect to any medium of communications including landlinc submarine cable microwave tropospheric scatter inospheric scatter satellite and the like The lines connect the ADMSC with other ADMSC or message relays and tributary stati ns directly or via other networks such as AUTOVON or a future automatic digital circuit switching network The power subsystem provides continuous power for sensitive loads and is designed so that a power failure will not cause loss of any message Normally the system utilizes the primary power available through local facilities Adequate uninterrupted power Is provided to maintamn operution from batteries for at least 15 minutes in the event of primary power failure The communications equipment consists of distribution frames and patching bays signal conversion equipment such as modsems and high level DC to low level DC and vice versa converters AUTOVON interface unit link encryption and decryptlon equipments the timing source the chronometer and consoles to monltor test control and coordinate communications performance and the provision of communications to the ADMS The switching center operation must be compatible with tributaries of various types other AUTODIN ADMSC and other teletypewriter networks It must be capable of automatic interoperation with AUTOVON tributaries and a future automatic digital circuit swi ch The switch must provide for format and code conversion necessary fur the exchange of traffic between devices utilizing a variety of trapsmission speeds and modes The modems and link encryption equipment are government furnished All of the other equipment is to be furnished by Philco- Ford There are five modes of operation with which the switch must be compatible at various speeds in either synchronous or asynchronous operation The console in the communications area is known as the station control console or more commonly the technical control console There are two operating positions in a 200-line ADMSC and one console operating position in the 100line ADMSC A console consists of three cabinets and two teletypewriter sets One cabinet is called a channel status display cabinet 1 Duplex operation with automatic error and channel controls allowing independent and simultaneous two-way transmission 2 Duplex operation without automatic error and channel controls allowing Independent and simultaneous two-way transmission The channel status display cabinet provides visual and audible indicat ons of the status of communications lines The equipment consists of a master alarm panel common alarm panel and system alarm panel Sensors are provided along the signal path in the communications area and in the line termination buffers When one of the sensors is activated it causes the indicator to illuminate and flash in a red color and a audible alarm to activate 3 Duplex operation with automatic error and channel controls but utilizing only one-way data transmission receive only without automatic error control and channel coordinationt and oordnatonuniquely hanel control in a duplex opTeletypewriter 5 eration with character framing detection and channel controls allowing indepenident and si multaneous two-way transmission The common line alarm panel shows which sensor or sensors caused the alarm When the alarm condition has cleared all alarm indications are extinguished Philco- Ford is providing two sizes of switches The larger size terminates 200 lines The smaller size switch is capable of terminating 100 lines Four of the smaller size switches are to be provided under the contract The training center at Ft Munmouth will be typical of the overseas centers The two other cabinets are known as the monitor test cabinets and house the channel selection mechanism controls and test equipment A selection by pushbuttons can be made to connect a line to the monitor test cabinet and then to specific test or monitor equipment Physically the communications area of the ADMSC consistp of equipment to accept signals from communic ations lines and transmit signals to commutications lines A teletypewriter set is used for outputs of status reports from the processor and input of information for status reports The teletypewriter set is used for monitoring traffic or 8 I I - ------ - F9 IEI ItL LAII Li Li Li I I U _ - C 4 0 WI W I 'U- I 0 A L2J 1 44 Wi %I _ 4± I rn I K Li - U - fI ___ __ _I- ___ f-y 9 signals and for coordination with distant-end stations ADMS did t dicta-ite St dipheiuais e to i the ecp the equipments to ie used except to specify solid state components for receiving processing and transmitting on a store-and-forward basis communications various of digital be used Modular forms construction techniques were to traffic Moduar onstucton echnque wee tvbe sed in the design and fabrication of the equipment to reiabiityand mximu permtpeforance performance reliability and permit maximum simplicity of opc ation and maintenance The number of different types of modules was to be kept to a minimum The Philco- Ford ADMS consists of processors peripheral equipment such as magnetic drums magnetic tapea high reped printprR card reader and card punch plus reconfiguration equipment sensor scanning equipment and consoles for operation of the switch network traffic handling and mantenance This equiptraffichadinan ment in combination mitenance with programming soequipsoftware receives processes stores and distributes the ribte res proc a torescand appropriate to t automatically traffic message output lines When difficulties are encountered by the automatic switch which are beyond the programmed capabilities the switch automatitally calls the condition to the attention of the The functional areas of the equipment were to be segmented so that redundant equipment or multiple modules required for operation are maintanable or replaceable without disrupting normal service It must be possible to add remove or repair standby modul s without interrupting service Like units assemblies subassemblies and replaceable parts must be physi- ally and functionally interchangeable without modification supervisory console operator and or prints out the message at the traffic service section teletypewriter There are six Philco 102 processors in a 200-1ine ADMS They are interchangeable in the functions of line traffic coordinator message processor and standby processor The interchangeability is accomplished by a recunfiguration swJich 10 Computing Centers New 1108 UNIVAC Computer System Rich Electronic Computer Center Grt'uia atitutl o 7 esrdolg t1ellat nla •gri 30332 The Georgia Institute of Technology has received approval to acquire a UNIVAC 1108-11 System Delivery was expected early In April and the system was expected to be fully operational by about April 15th mass storage capacity of 264 million characters both under dual channel control a Three 1004 reader printer punch devices for input output each served by one I O Acquisition of the $2 6 million UNIVAC 1108 provides Georgia Tech with a powerful third generation computing system This will greatly enhance the computing facilities of Georgia Tech and those of the entire University System of Georgia as well The UNIVAC 1108 will broaden the capability of the University System to perform work on research and service contracts It will also insure Georgia Tech's immediate progress into broader sharing of time systems It is noted that Georgia Tech is only the second channel These 1004 devices have the capability of reading 700 cards per minute and printing 600 lines per minute a Two communication terminals synchronous CTS with voice grade line adaptors and one CTS with a telephone broadband line adaptor One single channel tape controller with four high performance tape drives university to obtain one of these powerful new systems The University of Utah has the other 1108 System One high speed printer capable of printing 1100 lines per minute The UNIVAC 1108 System consists of the following The central processing unit for the 1108 will be installed on the second floor of the Rich Electronic Computer Center at Georgia i'ech in e A Central Processor with 65 000 words space now occupied by another much smaller computer system of core memory Twelve input output I O channels connected to the Central Processor Users of the new system will include Lockheed UNIVAC all academic departments of the school all divisions of the experiment station and government and industry o High performance drum storage capacity of 24 million characters and Fastran IBM 360 50 C' i en it ol IHaw ai Hlonolulu Ilauaii YCM22 Development of a campus-wide computing network was announced at the University of Hawaii with the unveiling of a new IBM System 360 is being used in support of more than 600 research projects ringing from studies of tidal waves to linguistics Dr W Wesley Peterson Acting Director of the Center said the System 360 would permit the University to keep p7e with the growing demands for computer time About 1400 faculty Installed at the University's Statistical and Computing Center the new computer a Model 50 is the most powerful system in the state It 11 j and students are using the Center he said and each day the Center processes more than 450 jobs ranging in duration from a few minutes to several hours High-energy nuclear physics Results of experiments carried out at the University of California at Berkeley are analyzed at the University of Hawaii's Computing Center As subatomic particles travei through a bubble chamber their tracks are photcgraphed from three directions Each of these photos is reduced tu a digital value and inserted into the compuler for analysis Formerly each photo had to be analyzed separately but with the increased speed and large Information storage capability of the System 360 nuclear researchers are provided with an immediate three dimensional analysis of the experiment Presently the System 360 is equipped with six IBM 2260 graphic display terminals These table-top units have a typewriter-Like keyboard to enter information into the System 360 and a cathode ray tube on which is displayed computerstored information The 2260s will be used by faculty researchers and students for a wide variety of projects including writing and editing computer programs It is anticipated terminals similar to this will be installed at the University's Hilo Campus on Hawaii the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology Coconut Island the Kewalo Basin Research Facility and several tidal wave research stations Data gathered at these off-campus installations will be sent directly to the computer via the terminals Meteorological and Oceanographic investigation In combining these two sciences researchers at the University of Hawaii are attempting to use the Computing Center to prepare atlases of the Indian Ocean The study involves characteristics of the o'ean floor temperatures of water at various depths direction and speed of currents wind direction and velocity air temperatures at various altitudes and methods of weather forecasting Linguistics By using a computer researchers are preparing lexicons or dietionaries of many polynesian and far eastern languages and dialects many of which are undocumented This study includes the translation of words and idiomatic phrases and how they change with time time Among the 600 projects presently being processed at the Computing Center are Tsunami research or the study of tidal waves The tsunami is believed caused by suboceanic earthquakes or underwater landslides But little is known about how tsunami travel through the mid-Pacific or how to predict their height before they strike land By using computers oceanographers are constructing mathematical models or simulating different conditions Some of these conciitions are the location and intensity of the earthquake and the cpnfiguration of the ocean bottom If some way were found to predict the size of the wave when the seismic activity was detected an accurate warning could be issued In addition the Computing Center is being used for studies in psychology social sciences political science astronomy biology and virLually all departments on campus It is also used for administrative and accounting functions including studert registration course scheduling student records payrolls and fees Environmental Support for the Fleet U S Flee A•Vumnpic al iW'eather Facility M lri nt ' Ca•di ornin 971 40 POSTULATES FOR A SUPPORT SYSTEM to be made would be that all environmental processes and phenomena must be specified in advance for a region extending from the ocean floor to near space Further the task must be completed as rapidly as resources permit Perishability dictates the latter common sense the former Environmental support agencies justify their existence by providing the products and services required by their users when the users need them This implies that the support must be complete rapid and accurate If the reader would confider the set of all possible Naval uperations in particular the minimum inference The logical extension of this appraisal has led at Fleet Numerical Weather Facility to the 12 formulation of the following unstulatem for an effective environmental support system 1 The environmental data cycle obnervation collection process analysis prognosis distribution display must be fully computerized 2 The oceans and atmosphere must be treated as a coupled hydrodynamic system 3 An engineering approach to the environmental problem must be employed 4 All research and development must be mission oriented FLEET NUMERICAb WEATHER FACILITY Fleet Numerical Weather Facility FNWF located on the grounds of the Naval Postgraduate School at Monterey California is the master computer center and controller of the Navy's Fnvironmental Data Network NEDN It has been under the command of Captain Paul M Wolff USN since its inception malu hi nlirata thoa tanx a hum' an specialist might take if that specialist had unlimited time and unusually good mental organization In xhort men nimply cannrt perform all the data quality control checks or make all the required computations for complete timlyv support in the time allowed I Given unlimited time moreover it is still doubtful if the job could be done by hand without violating the rnnnutrsa physical laws of the environment p Finally FNWF uses theoretical models in combination with proven synoptic principles The predictions are compared extensively with the observed features and their time variations Since most mathematical models are truncated in one degree or another the remaining terms must be optimized so that the outputs resemble the real environment In other words it is an engineering approach THE NUMERICAL PHILOSOPHY The availability of computer-produced environmental products of any desired form scale or projection had led to what is termed the numerical philosophy of FNWF Essentially this philosophy is concerned with the efiective use of system resources The specialist in the field in particular must be resourceful by devoting his time energy and talent to matters of interpretation and judgement - to critical analysis and feedback This is the correct role of today's environmentalist FNWF generates a rather complete set of the oceanographic and meteorological products and services required for worldwide Fleet support At the same time it develops and tests new computer techniques both in oceanography and meteorology Its support for Fleet operations in general and for ASW operations in particular has led many users to refer to FNWF as the world's leading oceanographic forecasting center CONCEPT OF OPERATIONS At this juncture one pertinent question would be Why is the operation at FNWF somewhat unique Certainly atmospheric and oceanographic prediction problems have been tackled before - in the universities in governmental agencies in industry But only a few agencies are using computers to produce operational environmental products And no other activity besides FNWF to my knowledge treats the atmosphere and oceans as a coupled hydrodynamic system with its complex mass-energy exchanges at the interface It is essential that FNWF embrace this total environment concept because most Naval operations take place near this air- ea boundary Without heat exchange and momentum exchange terms in the prediction models i4ealistic solutions might be precluded The Navy Environmental Data Network NEDN is the cardiovascular system of the Naval Weather Service Numerical products in the form of data fields maps messages special plots or listings are relayed simultaneously to primary computer sites at the rate of 4 000 words per minute error-free At these sites Fleet Numerical's products are tailored for specific user requirements Figure I depicts the NEDN configuration Ultimate dissemination of products is accomplished via two paths First fleet units copy products transmitted on the Navy's radiofacsimile and radioteletype broadcasts Second activities ashore receive products on the recently-activated West Coast and East Coast Tie Lines controlled by FWC Alameda and FWC Suitland respectively Each tieline station is equipped with automatic digital plotters and offline teletype playback equipment See Figure 2 9 ondly all steps in the FNWF data cycle from collection to display are fully computerized Computer technology Is applied to environmental analysis and prediction problems on a large scale and on a synoptic basis The 13 4I A- 0 J J i S i i i • l1 S t' ' ' - - atI 3F • • Figure 1 - Navy Environmental Data Network Fleet numerical Weather Facility generates and transmits hemispheric scale maps and messages to primary computer sites at FWC Guam FWC Pearl FWC Rota FWF Norfolk simultaneously on high speed data communications circuits tailored to use specifications on computers at these sites Products are 1604 is tied an FH880 Univac drum system with about one million 48-bit word capacity In June 1967 FNWF received a CDC 6500 COMPUTER EQUIPMENT The FNWF computer center houses five central processr computer system This has hshs2cnrlpoes cmue ytm Control Data Corporation CDC computers at The CDC 1604B is used for hemipresent sphriescaecmut TherCDC104Bisused aorhem spheric scale computations There are two CDC 3200 computers one for processing of ing units and 10 peripheral processing units Internal storage is 131K External storage consists of two CDC 6603 disc packs with total ca- raw data inputs and data filed outputs from the 1604 and one for research and development or pacity of 15 million words communications backup for the 3100 The recently-installed CDC 3100 is used for NEDN communications and utility programs An 8090 INTERIM SUMMARY The Navy Environmental Data Network with FNWF as master computer center represents an advanced state of the art in the matter of complete rapid environmental support for Fleet computer is tied full-time to the Digital Automated Weather Network DAWN the circuit on which most of the meteorological observations are received operations This is possible because of the sys- tem postulates discussed earlier The auxiliary storage for the 3200 systems A complete list of environmental products and services will be described in a later article is comprised of three Bryant drums with totel capacity of about 4 million 24-bit words On the 14 5I Wu9 __ I if Ra rnis£IEM WU Tiln4ewr Fiur -NDN talord coptrpodcdoengrpi prdCOTsOLE elutaeuoy digitalF ploter and ofln ARD15 oaSTTIE INESAD 0058 T-Eft- T9eaciiisaepoie ltp labc qipdwt qupet 1netoooia Paaini uO matic Computers and Centers Overseas Combined Industry University Government Computer Software Englisiah Elricrir leo Afarroni Computere 1 d Ijjndtojn SWJ IEignd n Details were announced of a tripartite project between English Electric-Leo-Marconi Cornputers Ltd the University of Edinburgh and the Ministry of Technology to provide advanced software for the operation of the multiaccess System 4-75 computer ordered by the Edinburgh Regional Computing Centre This is the first time that a commercial organisation a university and a Government department have cooperated on a major computer project The cost - estimated at approximately £350 000 over two and half years - is being shared by English Electric-Leo-Marconi and the Ministry of Technology The Ministry by placing a contract with the University of Edinburgh to the value of £195 000 is providing the financial support necessary to allow the University to participate in this work access computer By the early concentration of intensive effort and by cooperative action with the University of Edinburgh in bringing together a wealth of skills and experience a sophisticated multiaccess facility will be provided in the shortest poss' 1 e time By working together in this way the University and English Electric-Leo-Marconi will be making an outstanding contribution to the conservation of national programming resources INTERNATIONAL SOFTWARE CENTRE AT EDINBURGH The University of Edinburgh views the project as a major research and development undertaking in the field of computer software It will enable British staff to use a British multiaccess computer at a British University and will bring immense benefits to the national computer industry and further computer knowledge in Universities With the establishment of a skilled programming staff having experience in multiaccess software Edinburgh is expected to become a major international centre for research and development into programs for cornputer systems A major aim of the project is the provision of a sophisticated multiaccess computing facility and its exploitation in day-to-day use in the environment of a large Regional Computing Centre fulfilling University research and teaching needs and serving local industry and research organisations The jointly developed software will also be suitable for commercial use with a System 4-75 computer The purpose of the present project is to construct the basic multiaccess software structure for the System 4-75 computer Items of standard System 4 software will be used where appropriate in conjunction with this specialised software In particular System 4-70 operating system facilities for multiprogramming batch processing and program developmen will be able to coexist and be used without major functional change within the special operating environment of the multiaccess system English Electric-Leo-Marconi standard conventions and terminology for software are to be followed iii the interests of compatibility and PERT and related management facilities for monitoring the progress of the project will be provided Twenty five programmers are working on the project which was set up in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Edinburgh following the establishment of the Edinburgh Regional Computing Centre and the placing of an order with English Electric Leo Marconi for i System 4-75 multiaccess cornputer to equ p it The University has provided 11 programmers and the remainder has been seconded from the Systems Programming Department of English Electric Leo Marconi The team has already been working at the University for 4 months English Electric-Leo-Marconi welcomes the project as a means of shortening the development time scale necessary for the provision of software for the System 4-75 multi- The completion of the project will enable the University of Edinburgh to pursue a planned 16 MULTIACCESS COMPUTER IN 1968 dresring unit selects the pages of the programs which are most used by the computer subscribers and ensures that they are available for instant use The less frequently used pages of each program are held in the computer back-up store and can be brought into use in one sixtieth of a second The multiaccess computer will be delivered to the Edinburgh Regional Computing Centre in the summer of 1968 Initially it will be in the form of a System 4-70 computer and additional equipment will be delivered later in the year to provide multiaccess facilities The number of scientists and other users who will have simultaneous access to the comr200 Access puter will gradually build up to beover b remte ermials As an interim measure the Edinburgh Regional Computing Centre is renting an English SElectric- Leo- Marconi KF9 until the KDF computerunith System 4-75 machine is available It was installed in November 1966 and has been operating for 14 hours per day since the beginning of the year Use of the KDF 9 computer has enimmediately a service to offer the Centre abled users and research workers in to University in worker to U Rcsearch isers Institutes Indiresearc local and Units in particular sequence of research into conversational programming console languages program debugging systems computer aided design specialist problem orientated languages and future computer system structures by remote terminals to the computer to will th be comuterwillthose located in offices throughout Edinburgh and as far away as Aberdeen Each will have full and immediate use of the machine which will also be capable of accepting and running programs for standard production work initiated within the Regional Centre It is expected that 3000 undergraduates will be among the users of the system The multiaccess facility m'tkes use of a technique known as paging in which the ad- administered by the Agricultural Research Counci Council Commercial and industrial users will be encouraged to approach the Edinburgh Regional Computing Centre for facilities on the KDF 9 computer and to facilitate this a number of applications programs produced by the Bureau Division of English Electric-Leo-Marconi will be made available to the Centre Computerized Crime Pr ntion Idternalijal 'ompulrr t and fahulUart r Limited v• S m %11'i 15 Enlan The police force in Dorset in conjunction with the computer staff of the County Treasurer's Department has devised a computer scheme to help with crime prevention and detection in the country The scheme represents the most determined attempt yet by any force to use the power of a computer in the fight against crime It was brought into operation during January 1967 and makes use of the County Council's Data Processing Department which has a newly installed I C T 1902 computer which are preventable and detectable by patrols have occurred These same maps will show the disposition of patrols at corresponding times of thu day It should then be possible to make appropriate and timely adjustments to patrol routes to cover the pattern of crime Subsequently the effect of this redeployment of personnel both as a deterrent and a detection aid can readily be assessed It is the speed and accuracy of the computer in assembling sorting and analysing masses of facts that makes such a system possible At present for each crime committed in Dorset a detailed statistics sheet is completed in less than a minute by the investigating officer This includes all major - and many minor - characteristics of the offence For example information about a break-in indicates which of 40 or so different methods of entry was used and even classifies in detail the type of property stolen From the completed statistics sheet a card is punched At the end of the month punched cards for all newly committed strictly newly reported crimes are read by the computer which juggles In January 1965 Dorset Constabulary became the first police force in the country to use a computer to establish trends and patterns of criminal offences and redeploy patrols accordingly A limited scheme was used based upon detailed crime statistics prepared very rapidly by the Council's previous computer - an I C T 1301 But the new scheme built upon the experience gained in 1965 and 1966 classifies and presents the necessary information in a form that can be readily interpreted and used by senior officers The computer will show in map form precisely where and when crimes 17 the mass of facts and figures to produce detailed analyses Output tabulations printed automatically by the computer show crin'o' by Ares time of the day day of the week type and so on From information presented in this form Dorset police have over the past two years been able to recognise the more obvious criminal patterns while at the same time preparing all statistics required by the Home Office With the output from the I C T 1902 comnputh presented In a direct graphical form and puterimesented as a mark grapievenmthe crimes indicated as a mark on a map even the slightest trends should be instantly detectable Maps are prepared by area time of day and day of week It is for example possible for the computer to mark the locations to within a few hundred yards of all crimes committed in the town of Poole between sunrise and noon on a Monday Direct comparison is then possible with known patrol distributions Although an enormous number of factors influence the crime rate in various parts of the enunt ry It in interesting that while the provisional 1966 crime figures for England and Wales show substantial increases over 1965 Dorset and its computer can boast a 2 percent reduction in crime coupled with a 10 percent increase in detections A similar system operates with regard to traffic accidents and the deployment of motor patrols This has revealed a striking similarity in accident pattern by time day and location from week to week and year to year Detective Superintendent H Green head of Dorset's C I D who has been working on this project has been awarded a 1967 Winston Churchill Travelling Fellowship to enable him to spend six months in the United States studying the use of computers for crime prevention and detection European Datel System The AI anoni Cn'nm Limited Cheliman • E u• v En glan'd An international data communications systern the first of its type In Europe is being supplied by The Marconi Company to Esso Europe Inc and its affiliates in Europe Initially it will interconnect Britain France Germany Holland and Denmark in a scheme which will dramatically speed the flow of data from one country to another data can be transmitted between two countries This new tool for business and commerce has a vast potential considering the numbers and types of business machines and computers which can now be interconnected internationally The next step could be the rapid development of global data links via communication satellites The equipment which is being supplied is one of the latest in a range of special data transfer systems which have been designed by The Marconi Company and which is collectively known as Marconidata In particular the type H 6010 which has been ordered by Esso has been specifically designed to handle all type of digital data including computer traffic The data is stored momentarily by the Marcunidata terminal prior to being fed into a computer at a rate of 50 000 characters per second thereby reducing computer interrupt time to a minimum The order is the first to make widespread use of the international Datel service which is gradually being extended by the use of STD throughout Europe see Fig 1 Marconi's equipment will enable Esso Headquarters in five countries to exchange information with great accuracy at speeds in excess of ten times that of the normal telex service It is anticipated that eventually additional terminals will be sited at key locations in Belgium and Italy John R Farrar Marconi's Chief of Data Sales looks forward to a time when there is a world-wide network of the data transfer links like the Esso system The Marconi system operated in conjunction with the Datel service provides the answer to the problems of international data communications Whether Britain joins the Common Market or not we anticipate a large number of sales to the large industrial organisations and other bodies with important associates overseas The Marconidata equipment has one other important function it completely eliminates any errors caused by interference with the telephone circuit Accurate transmission is ensured by a highly effective method of parity coding which prevents errors being reproduced Not more i an one error in 10 000 000 ever goes undetected Data flow from one country to a computer in another country can be achieved faultlessly utilising the minimum of computer time We have now reached the stage when by The Esso scheme initially involves the installation of transmit receive terminals at an ordinary telephone call large volumes of 18 %I improvd by he opning f igueovr te 1T -urpand covete telephone dialing service between Britain and some continental countries ona comuictinueuimeta be fed into the terminals and faithfully reproduced at the receiving station in its original form or fed directly into a computer on-line without the need for human intervention This system -offectively brings computing facilities directly to a number of remote stations via ordinary telephone circuits The introduction of STD into Britain has enabled industrial and commercial organisations to transmit data to subsidiaries throughout the U K Marconidata is already installed in a variety of data transfer systems currently in operation This equipment is now in full production in the Marconi factories The original Marconidata system was first Further developments will permit the use of a wider variety of remote introduced some two years ago to provide facili- input-output devices 19 Fn Meteorology Computer Use Cummonuvalth Hureau of MrkurorolVy Afol orrp Aust•ralia Weather information of vital importance to Australia's primary industries airlines shipping tourism and the private citizen will soon be processed here by a new and powerful twin computer centre During normal operation one Model 65 processor will extract and analyse meteorological data and carry out prognosis on a real time basis-- that is simultaneously with the arrival of data via communications lines It will operate day and night The Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology will install the certral computing facility in Melbourne where a large IBM computer complex costing approximately $4 million will be linked by a communications system with meteorological data sources and information users throughout Australia and overseas The second Model 65 will be available for research development and generally the center's nonroutine tasks while providing full back up to the first central processor The complete computing and communications system will not become operational for some time to come It will be installed in two phases over a number of years The new centre will play an important role in the World Weather Watch planned by the World Meteorological Organization in response to a request of the United Nations General Assembly It will have the responsibilities of a World Weather Centre together with similar centres in Washington and Moscow exchanging global weather data and charts Installation of the initial phase will begin in early 1968 with the arrival of the first Model 65 and peripheral equipment required to operate the computer in conjunction with the Bureau's existing system of communications To help Australia's weathermen in local weather forecasting the computers will process round the clock data from nearly 1 000 surface reporting stations supolying meteorological observations gathered in the Australian Area the Southern Hemisphere and the Tropical Region This includes a complex of telegraph services to relay meteorological data to the Central Office Regional Offices in State Capitals and Darwin and Meteorological Stations such as seaports and airports From the Central Office in Melbourne analysed data are distributed over a nationwide facsimile network Using this data the computer centre will assist in issuing forecasts -including warnings of weather conditions likely to endanger life and property - plot weather charts compile lists of selected observations carry out statistical processing and research calculations including mathematical modelling and generally apply the latest principles of electronic data processing to the Bureau's principal functions In Phase I of the installation the Bureau's systems analyst and programmers will develop and test the necessary programs and procedures for off-line use of the computers Electronic Equipment in the centre will include two identical IBM System 360 Models 65 central processors with high speed printers and magnetic disk drives capable of storing and updating vast quantities of weather data During Phase 2 the Bureau will put into practice the procedures developed In Phase 1 while continuing further development work towards the ultimate system to be linked on-line with communications The peripheral equipment will also include magnetic tape units visual display stations with television-like screens capable of retrieving and flashing in seconds tabulated weather data Meanwhile the Bureau is expected to invite tenders for an advanced communications system capable of linking the computers in Melbourne on-line with data source and information users throughout Australia Graphic plotting equipment linked to the central processor will automatically plot weather charts showing the movement of weather patterns over Australia and adjacent geographic areas The Australian Bureau of Meteorology and overseas services already have introduced a measure of automation into weather monitoring Installation of the second phase is expected to begin towards the end of 1968 and will comprise the second Model 65 and additional peripheral equipment 20 I and fnporpatinw Tn tha uf fa w irora hnwvar th arlnhal feIophnn nm the pace of research and development in the environmental sciences has considerably quickened The preeent state of the art of applying computers and communications in meteorology represents only a beginning o 4nnaaram hlh are very closely interrelated One purpose of the World Weather Watch is to enable countries to obtain data which they cannot get under the existing world system The requirements for processed data are taken into account to specify the output requirements of the global observational system This system must therefore provide for thn individual data requirements of Meteorological Services and also for the data requirements of the global data processing system The World Weather Watch as planned by the World Meteorological Organization In response to a resolution of the United Nations General Assembly highlights the growing worldwide interest in improving communications between centres of meteorology and developing new techniques of prognosis on a global scale With the announcement of a large dual computer system for its Melbourne based centre the Australian Burrý u of Meteorology and IBM Australia will cooperate in the extensive pioneering which lies ahead in creating the computer programs and systems necessary to apply the new computers in the first instance to local weather operations and later to weather analyses and prognoses on a global scale for the ultimate users of the World Weather Watch the National Meteorological Services of the world The three centres of the World Weather Watch in Melbourne Washington and Moscow will become focal points in the drive for better understanding of local weather in terms of global weather patterns The World Weather Watch will comprise three distinct systems the global observational system the global data processing system and 21 Miscellaneous Project GENIE I'nd•' iven J Caldlwnia Berkrieb • C 'ai orma 9• 020 Man-computer interaction is the subject of a research project started in 1962 by Prof H D Huskey and others and supported by the Advanced Research Projects Agency ARPA of the Department of Defense Carnegie Institute of Technology MIT and Stanford University have similar contracts devoted to the field of computer applications The Berkeley program known locally as the ARPA project but more widely throughout the nation as the Berkeley Time-Sharing System was christened Project Genie some two years ago before the direction of its research was completely fixed Now it involves about thirty-five people including Profs Gary Hornbuckle H D Huskey Butler Lampson W W Lichtenberger P L Morton and M W l'irtle working with an overall investment that so far totals almost $2 million If all this information is fed into the machine even with an ingenious program the usual result is that no feasible solution appears Presentday computers must then dump the partial solutions and hours of study may be required before the nature of the difficulty is recognized and some change in the input data is proposed such as canceling sections with zero enrollhent and offering others at more convenient hours If the schedule officer can examine key portions of the machine solkktion before the dump then suggest alternati ves and restart computation immediately a feasible solution may be found with a few hours - fov example before the end of the registration period and the start of classes Many other examples of conversational use of machines have been proposed often for purposes of engineering design or architectural sketching where experience and judgment rather than merely mathematical algorithms must be applied to large bodies of information and data Because modern computers work so enormously fast compared with the response time of the human user the notion of time sharing with many users served simultaneously by one expensive but very capable machine has evolved to bring the human expert back into the solution process at the most useful time Conversational use of computers in which the machine responds at once to each instruction presented by the user at the input console is not new Early computers were frequently used in that way especially during preparation of programs and exploration of new techniques But larger more expensive and faster machines forced a change to batch processing The Berkeley Computer Center for example may process a thousand separate jobs in a day with most of them occupying less than a minute of macine time each Because it is so difficult to write a perfect program at the first attempt the time required for complete solutiun usually includes several runs irterspersed with periods of debugging and refinement of the program Thus the turn-around time rather than the time used for computing by the machine usually fixes the total time required for problem soluti3n and in a busy center those problems which require direct human intervention may be completely impractical Most of the effort in the ARPA project has been devoted to the development of the extensive and flexible Berkeley-Time-SharingSystem As it now runs in Cory Hall it can handle up ta 16 remote terminals Some of these terminals are connected to teletypewriters by telephone lines but others are connected to increasingly capable graphic consoles with cathode-ray-tube displays Improvement of the system is leading more and more to its use by project members for attacks on new problems of man-machine interaction Among the most interesting are the new languages in which instructions may be written the different terminals may each use a different language or several may share a library program without interference Inactive or sleepy users get swapped out of the system's active memory in microseconds The college scheduling problem with an enormous mass of information about courses and hours classrooms available and instruc t or teaching preferences student schedules and requiz ed courses curricular changes and lastminute enrollments is typical of problems that still cannot be solved without human intervention 22 I but obtain sensibly instantaneous response when next they present an instruction or a query market and thus Justify the federal support of engineering research A striking compliment to the efforts of the project members appears in recent advertising of Scientific Data Systems Corp which is marketing systems patterned after the one developed here Few federally sponsored university projects lead so quickly to improvement of the products available to the public on the open Successful as it has been however the project finds itself still far from the ultimate goal suggested by Prof Lichtenberger who would place really good computation conveniently operated and without any artificial or uniecessary restrictions in the hands of every user with an important need Shipboard Computer Control Programs Cursaril 4rrounui at L bwralw' Inc Bu lao N'e York 14221 A computer technique developed by Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory for shipboard computers of the U S Navy will automatically design computer programs for optimally controlling the varied complex equipment on modern naval ships Skilled computer engineers have previously been required to design and program such functions system from a broad class o0 systems can be chosen for actual use An automatic controller designer is actually a large compiling program which can automatically develop optimum control programs These programs can be used in existing Navy digital computers for controlling a unit of the ship's equipment CAL's design technique developed for the Naval Ship Systems Command enables an engineer or technician to specify in simple terms the characteristics of the ship's system equipment to be controlled as well as measure of performance A large scale computer program using the information then automatically proceeds to design the digital controller so that optimum performance is achieved Many ships are now equipped with computers in order to get the best performance from complex equipment Dr Stephen Hoppe of CAL's Computer Research Department the principal investigator of the automatic design project has completed a prototype digital controller synthesizer which is useful for a broad class of control systems Automatic design is accomplished through three distinct program phases The first phase is that of converting simple problem descriptions provided by the engineer into a form more readily used by the computer The second phase proceeds to the design of alternative candidate digital controllers and produces the digital control programs which can be used in the control computer Automatic evaluation of the designs is performed by the third phase which provides the engineer with a graphical description of what performance he can expect from the control system Aboard each Navy Ehip are numerous power machinery systems which must be controlled Conventional control devices such as analog computers are limited because of their inflexibility to change and the consequent restrictiuns on possible control designs The advent of the digital computer has opened new avenues of approach to the control of such devices as ships' rudders ships' guns fire control systems and other shipboard machinery Othcr areas of Cornell T ab's research for the Naval Ship Systems Command during the past several years include the development of schemes for tracking hostile aircraft development of a technique for directing interceptor aircraft against their targets the evaluation of targets and the evaluation of target threat from available information The most recent series of studies has dealt with the problem of control and direction of shipboard equipment solely by digital computers The technique is considered by CAL to have broad applications in modern control systems design The effe'tiveness of the automatic design now permits the engineer to design systems efficiently and expeditiously so that many designs can be considered and the best candidate 23 rI Computerized Crime Information 1iwid Cu wan Public aJrlY lk wrtmern 1iaoni Florida 117132 Ail law enforcement officers throughout Dade County can ask a centrally located comnputer for vital crime information and get answers in seconds as a result of new equipment unveiled in May 1967 When it receives a request the computer automatically searches its electronic files for information compiles an answer sends it back to the terminal and prints It on an IBM 1050 typewriter The typewritten message is then radioed back to the requesting officer While newspaper radio and TV representatives in the Dade County Public Safety Department Building watched a teletypewriter fed inquiries by wire to the Dade County Courthouse and into an IBM System 360 computer The machine will serve as the information storehouse of Florida's first computer-operated police information network E Wilson Purdy Director of Dade County Public Safuty Department said the computer already has aata on 670 000 loric vehicles including owners' names vehicls descriptions and identification numbers Once the computer's files are completely loaded Purdy stated we expect the speed of the system in many instances will enable police to apprehend criminals before they have a chance to get away from the scene of the crime In less than a minute the computer fed back answers officers will need in identifying drivers automobiles and license plates connected with law violations Classes of information will be broadened it was pointed out D ide's public safety director explained the computer's files which can store about 400 milliun characters of information will be fully utilizc d to hold data on stolen autos and license plates warrants stolen property and guns and wanted criminals Dean Claussen chairman of the Central Communications and Records Sub-Committee of Dade County which began work on the project 10 months previous described the new police information system as the product of excellent cooperation be 'een local municipalities and the county The new system eventually will be tied through communications lines into the Federal Bureau of Investigation IBM System 360 computer at the recently established National Crime Informat'on Center Washington D C Pointing out the computer-based network will provide many benefits including saving of time for officers who formerly had to wait for files to be searched Claussen a Miami Shores councilman said Law enforcement men will get their information 10 times faster than ever before The central computer in tl e courthouse will be performing other county wn- at the same time it is operating t e'n' information network The mach- ý several data proces ' J This not only will result in more solutions of crimes through rapid identification of suspects and evidence but also officers can apply more of their time to crime prevention and law enforcement '' of performing ul aneously Types of work bei --- ' 'ed include payrolls tax collections mid W1l statistics and other accounting work An interlocking system of teletype and radio communications among a number of police departments in Dade County will enable all municipal and Metro officers to secure answers from the central computer Ben Demby City of Miami Director of Communications explained in demonstrating the equipment at the press conference The Central Communications and Records Sub-Committee includes Dean R Claussen Miami Shores chairman Metro Commissioner Harold A Greene Ben Demby Director of Communications City of Miami Earl Schroeder Director of Data Processing Dade County Charles Zmuda Chief of Central Services Dade County Captain R J Crittenden Coral Gables Police Dept Captain Jesse Webb Miami Beach Police Dept Captain L D Leggett Hialeah Police Dept David Walker Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Co and Paul Stockelman IBM Corp The City of Miami Communications Center and Dade County Public Safety Department will act as collecting terminals passing inquiries by telephone line connections into the computer central 24 Ii The sub-committee has operated as part of the Joint Liaison Committee representing Met- R Hardy Matheson and Earl M Starnes Arthur M Snyder former mayor of North Miami municipalities Miami Vice Mayor Stephen P Clark Thomas C Britton County Attorney and Allen Clements Jr and Russ Marchner representing Dade League of Municipalities ropolitan Dade aunty government and Dade Beach Mayor Clyde M Taylor u SuuU Miamni Other members comprising the joint liaison committee include Metro Commissioners Computerized 'Tax Records Alinnealmli Ainn• • ia 5 5415 In 1967 Hennepin County installed a new computer designed for high ipeed handling of records and better ser ee C' the taxpayers of As questions occur answers will be available Instantly at both county and local levels Assessors in each city now keep books identical to those here in the courthouse With a terminal in his office the local assessor won't have The IBM System 360 Model 30 will centralize the county's record keeping program and provide a far greater degree of fiscal control to save taxpayers' dollars and county employees' time to keep manual records Minnesota's largest coun y Other department heads will assign new jobs to the System 360 as the workload increases Programming and planning phases are already under way to meet a January 1969 target date for completion of the centralized system It was one of the first few county governments in the nation to install this system Robert P Janes County Board Chairman says the installation of the new computer will permit us to combine the data processing tasks of the auditor treasurer and assessor in an up-to-the-minute tax accounting information system At that time these departments will make inquiries through a kind of typewriter and will receive near-instantaneous answers on a television screen Telephone lines link the typewriter-television screen to the computer so communication and response are almost immediate Preparing tax reports is the computer's pilot project It will electronically program and process tax statements from direct inquirles and information previously handled manually and with more speed and accuracy than ever before In addition to the new tax information system the county's new computer is currently handling accounting for the General Hospital Municipal Court District Court and the Welfare department Data on each parcel of land in the county will be electronically stored in the computer and updated as the county and town assessors report changes Janes explains Having been fed this information the System 360 will generate tax statements and supporting registers for the auditor and treasurer Six special television-like terminals will Dale G Folstad Data Processing director says We are considering a control program for the 1 5 million books in the thirteen Minneapolis and 22 county library branches The computer could handle circulation book ordering shelf lists delinquency reporting indexing and book labeling be installed in the offices of the auditor and treasurer By using display stations personnel will be able to call out of storage Information about a parcel of land and update it read it for information or prepare reports from it We hope to provide better service to taxpayers at less cost One person can operate the System 360 but we will assign new tasks to the employees now recording informatd c n nually as the volume of work increases 25 f I rLAT0 Coordinated Sciences Laboratory Un imrsit of Illiw is1 Urballa Jlltioi • 61 01 INTRODUCTION student-station equipment Circuitry for the elimination of ion-spot formation and for more effective total erasure is being considered It is expected that experimental circuitry to provide for better erasure axnd less ion-spot degradation will be operable by the end of the coming semi-annual period The Coordinated Science Laboratory has been deeply involved for the past several years in the development of a computer-based education system - the PLATO system see DCN July 1966 In the early phases of this project the major effort was in the development of a research system and its implementation into classroom use In its present form the system consists of a CDC 1604 computer and a classroom of twenty student stations With the cornpletion of this system the attention of the group has properly turned to a more intensive study of the educational aspects of the system with particular emphasis on the development of a large scale computer-based educational system Equipment for the generation of 16-mm film frames via cathode-ray tube has been completed Checkout is not complete in that solutions to problems regarding alignment of CRT raster and film-exposure times have not been completely solved Solutions are straightforward and will be achieved through several trial runs to be conducted in the near future A special keyset featuring codeable keys and flexible key formating has been constructed and checked out An additional keyboard to be used in conjunction with the special keyset is being considered by its principal user In recognition of the importance of this large-scale concept to the future developments fur the University of Illinois and more broadly for the region and nation the University has organized the Computer-based Education Research Laboratory CERL under the direction of Dr Louis D Volpp This Laboratory has assumed responsibility for directing the program and for determining the nature and magnitude of the next engineering system that will be developed Many of the staff associated with the PLATO project in the Coordinated Science Laboratory are now continuing their work in the new Laboratory some on a part-time basis and others fulltime The two laboratories will retain a close working relationship and will continue to develop programs of mutual interest PLATO IV EQUIPMENT Student Terminals Preliminary work has been started on the development of a prototype of the student terminal to be used in the PLATO IV system A block diagram of the proposed terminal is shown in Fig 1 For a display the terminal will contain a plasma display panel now under development by D L Bitzer and H G Slottow The panel will be approximately 14 inches square and contain 512 positions along each PLATO SYSTEM EQUIPMENT axis PLATO Ill Equipment A digitally addressable slide projector permits prestored textbook information to be projected on the display panel The slide projector has a proposed capacity of 500 or more slides all addressable by the computer Work has continued in the development of circuitry that would update or provide special capabilities for a twenty-station computerbased teaching system All data arriving from the central computer enter the terminal through the input register Data rates both into and out of the terminal will be held to 1200 bps to permit data transmission over voice-grade telephone circuits Assuming a word length of 20 bits the terminal will receive data at about 60 words per second Circuitry for the elimination of spurious writing caused by storage-tube grid emission has been installed and checked out for all This work was supported in part of the Advanced Research Projects Agency through the Office of Naval Research under ContractNonr3985 08 by 1he Office of Education under Contract No 0' -6-10-184 and by the Mercy Hospital School of Nursing With proper data-word formats this will provide adequate data rates to handle most applications For example packing three characters per word allows a character writing rate 26 icated telephone network within the University S q1D11 I To permit isolated use of a terminal such as in awill private hume however be provided to connectantheacoustical terminal coupler to an ordinary telephone receiver e Audio Capability V The study of audio storage continues Of various systems contemplated to date one employing magnetic-oxide coated discs is considered the most appropriate for the specifications of the system and the resources of the laboratory Experimental apparatus is being devised and constructed for the evaluation of basic ideas involved in the disc scheme It is expected that a judgment as to the feasibility of the disc scheme will be realized by the end of the comIng period - s P•oj o Sow 4 OIJIb E L Figure I BEHAVIORAL SCIENCE PROJECTS Learning and Retention of Materials Verbal Proposed PLATO IV terminal A PLATO program PAVLEW was re 'ied and completed early in 1967 It provides a means of running verbal learning experiments on many subjects simultaneously under a variety of procedural timing and material conditions The program includes its own response recording doping in binary form Improvements were also made on program RAWDATA which analyzes the PAVLEW responses of 180 characters per second which is about 18 to 20 Li nes faster than most teletypewriters From the input register data may be transferred to the x and y registers for display to the character generator to select characters to the slide projector to select a slide or to an external device connected to the terminal such as an audio storage unit Two experiments are currently in progress The first is concerned with a demonstration that subjects' idiosyncratic mediations have played a determining role in confounding the results of experiments in testing important variables relating to the interference theory of forgetting The second is an attempt to demonstrate the effectiveness of a measure of idiosyncratic mnemonic probability to predict retention W E Montague and H Kiess have developed a measure of Associability which for a pair of consonant-vowel-consonant items is the proportion of subjects able to generate a mediator for the pair The study attempts to determine the functional relationship between Associability and Recall The character generator will contain 256 characters of which 128 are permanently installed with the remaining 128 being interchangeable The interchangeable set of characters may contain foreign-language alphabets or other special symbols as may be required The keyset provides the terminal operator with a means of communicating with the central computer Data from the keyset is entered in the output register and transferred serially to the computer An external input to the output register is provided to allow external equipment at the terminal to transmit data to the computer Research on Attention Control The control unit directs the operation of the entire terminal and supervises the flow of data in and out of the terminal The PLATO system is being used in an experiment to determine whether a response contingency affects the amount of time a student spends learning and the amount of material he triLs to master In order to test the hypothesis It is planned to have the vast majority of these terminals operating in some form of ded27 students are being exposed to different types of lesson material In one session some of he material on which they are tested is highly predictable and the other material on which they are tested is not predictable Two trial runs with twenty students each were made in December of the students were in the control group and 32 in the experimental group Of tho 8 students 41 were females and 25 were males The students came from six colleges within the University Table 1 lists the six colleges represented with the number of students in each college Table 1 Distribution of Students by Group Interaction Colleges within the University C Programming and planning for groupInteraction studies continued throughout the year An inter-nation simulation in cooperation with Dr Harold Guetzkow of Northwestern University has been prepared and tested in March and April 1967 A basic computer program permits the participants to read write send and receive information used in the group negotiations The sending and receiving are controlled by communication rules which help define the roles of the decision makers Using this facility they plan to study principles of negotiation and train students in negotiating techniques Students Liberal Arts and Sciences Education 37 12 Fine and Applied Arts Agriculture 9 5 Engineering Physical Education 2 1 Over half of the students in the experiment were either freshmen or sophomores Table 2 gives the complete number of students in each class Interpersonal Behavior A project concerned with filming computergenerated figures to provide animated scenes of interpersonal behavior has been under the direction of Prof C E Osgood New equipment was designed and tested to facilitate the experiments Two test runs have been made Colleges Table 2 Student Breakdown by Class Standing Class Some difficulty still lies in the control of shading in the pictures LEARNING AND TEACHING RESEARCH Electrical Engineering 322 Circuit Analysis I Students Freshman 25 Sophomore Junior Senior 22 5 14 Both the control and experimental groups were given a pretest mid-term final and post-test The post-test was the same form as the pretest A student-attitude questionnaire was also administered to each student in the experiment The lesson material prepared for the circuit-analysis course in electrical engineering was used by twenty students in the fall seaceter Thirty-five students from two sections of the course used this material during the spring Some minor revisions to the material are being made FORTRAN Programming Course for Business Students Library Science 195- Introduction to Library Use The on-line interpretative compiler is nearing completion The program will allow students as a part of lessons in FORTRAN programm'ing to compose simple FORTRAN programs at the PLATO station these programs will be immediately executed and the results shown on the PLATO display The three-semester experiment for LIBUSE the first University-of-Illinois credit course given entire i using the PLATO system was completed during the fall semester A total of 66 students participated Thirty-four 28 Path Computer-based Education for a Nursing Program • si•vJ SA course in Maternity Nursing is being A program that caleglatla what problem the student works on de-v pending upon his choice of review area previous performance and 'help needs prepared fur use on the PLATO system To date four units approximately 18 hours of course material have been written The logic adopted is a combination of inquiry and tutorial Students are presented with questions which force them to seek the information necessary for their answers and to analyze and synthesize as well as collect data Terms A program that gives the student definitions of basic genetic terms Check A program that checks the student's answers Special parts of this program analyze the student's answer according to its type e g genotype gamete ratio probability word and give diagnostic error messages the genotype checker has over twenty error mesL 4ges Help A subprogram of path that is activated after student pushes the key the This sequence leads tHelstudent Thru siupled Completed material is presently being tested on 18 student subjects from Mercy Hospital School of Nursing a 2-year diploma program Data from these first test runs are being used mainly for revision of material The basis of the new inquiry-tutorial cornputer program is pute the generalized tutorial logic proram Help developed for use with the electrical-engineering and library courses To this have been added sources of information for the students which are a dictionary a data section and an investigation mode in which simulated experiments can take place A keyword judger has been included which allows the student flexibility in the structure of responses and also recognizes duplicate answers Just as new judging subroutines may easily be added to the basic program variation in the investigation subroutines is a simple editing task qhesti d answer s tomalical questionsananswers to a logical genetic answer to his problem For example in parent-offspring problems the bulk of genetic probtues the Help sequence asks the can when hetes ed t can form The is asked to unite the gametes from each parent to form the genotypes of all possible offspring Finally he is asked to tally the genotypes and the physical appearance of these genotypes Further organization and generalization of the new program will provide one of the most flexible teaching logics now available for use with the PLATO system In addition to these programs the basic programs linking the student input to the com- GENETICS PROGRAMS puter output of writing erasing etc are completed Many small programs that set up a problem of a given type are completed College Genetics The program was demonstrated in March to faculty members concerned in teaching basic A basic college-genetics review has been genetics and a trial student run was scheduled programmed for the PLATO system The program has been designed to be used in any of the more than half-dozen courses teaching basic genetics at the University of Illinois It is designed to discover a student's weakness in basic genetics to aid the student by leading him through the genetic logic involved in olving problems and to aid the instructor by freeing him from spending the great amounts of time needed to personally help students with problems in basic genetics for early spring Junior High-School Genetics A simulated genetics laboratory for the PLATO system GENO has been used by five groups of junior high-school students The program permits students to select parents by specifying their genotypes GENO will then randomly select offspring plot these on the screen and keep a tally of the number of offspring of each possible type as well as the total number of offspring Students may select one offspring or any number less than 10 000 at a At the present time the major parts of programming that are completed or under final development are 29 i solving an equation Most of the same pro- fc o V l 45C tions either those presented by a lesson or those input by the student for evaluating polyLuwIlal expressions for arbitrary replacements of the variable and for utilizing a PLATO keyset as a desk calculator The portions of the program needed for typing equations and for judging whether they are % •ll-formed are now complete The portions needed for equation solving have been outl'- ed but not coded time They may then tally the results and select more offspring it desired or begin over by selecting a new set of parents GENO will also do arithmetic problems for the students enabling them to easily find the coordinates for graphs which they construct from their data grkI hl u Mathematics Ill College Algebra A team of mathematicians is studying the application of computer-based education to the teaching of college algebra During the first semester of the 1966-67 academic year Mr J Casey and Mr R Williams each taught Mathematics 111 to a class of University-of-Illinois college freshman They were asked to take special notice of deficiencies in the backgrounds which their students brought to the course and of topics which seemed to be especially difficult for the students They also collected copies of their exwninations and photocopies of their students' examination papers Errors made by the students on these examinations have been analyzed by Mr H Will His analysis is available to guide the team On-line Structural Design An experimental program for on-line design of structures using the PLATO facilities has been completed The program lb applicable to the design of continuous beams only but all program components have been designed so that they are applicable to much more general structures There is no teaching logic built into the program the student-user is free to formulate problems input and modify data and select options to be executed The results requested are displayed in the fis a of graphs but hard-copy printed output ca also be requested As a first effort no attempt is being made to produce a compu er-based course in algebra Rather several troublesome topics have been selected and appropriate lessons are being prepared The first two topics chosen are mathematical functions and equation solving The first was chosen because it appears to be the most difficult important concept in the course The second was chosen because it is probably the most important concept in the course French Instruction There have been 255 characters constructed that are useful in language programming for PLATO In addition a program logic involving ten modes has been designed which will comprise a very flexible means for teaching the reading and writing of any major European language Provision is made in the logic for audiolingual skills so that these aspects can be added when the PLATO audio capabilities become available Mr Williams is teaching a section of Mathematics 111 the second semester His 'lass is available to the team for observation and his students are being used to test the new lessons Mr Wills is writing lesson material for the topic of mathematical functions Tenta tively it is expected that these lessons will utilize one of the versions of the tutorial teaching logic Mr Casey is developing several new judgers needed for the lessons Mr Beberman is expected to join in the effort to produce these lessons A preliminary program restricted to the teaching of reading skills in French has been constructed and is in the final stages of debugging Texts have been selected for use with this program and fifty pages have been prepared for presentation on PLATO Preliminary student runs were scheduled Based on experience gained in using this preliminary program with volunteer students and possibly with French 400 students modifications in the design of the ten-mode logic will be made Mr W Golden is developing a program which permits the entry of algebraic equations in standard format from the keyset That is it accepts vertically-arrayed fractions exponents multiplication implied by juxtaposition and so forth The program rejects malformed expressions and when it is completed it will solve equations entered by the student The initial use of this program is as a judger that will be able to determine whether a student is correctly AUTOLAB AUTOLAB is an introduction to the collection recording and analysis of data Students 30 are told they are quality-control engineers for PROGMAT terrains which of three subcontracting firms may be supplying IM with faulty acceleratorThe computer simiulates a l breturn pring collecting spring data at the student's request allowing students to concentrate upon the processing and interpreting of data rather than on time-consuming laboratory manipulations PROGMAT is a program which collects and analyzes test data It is now complete Student runs for calibration will be carried out during the spring Sassistant SIRA SYSTEM FOR INSTRUCTIONAL RESPONSE ANALYSIS Synopsis of Project Work During AUTOLAB students work with thetr teacher use printed materials and the cornputer so that each of these elements of the teaching situation is coordinated For the students the primary importance of the program lies in experience gained by exposure to an unfamiliar situation and in their attempts to collect and analyze data about this situation The main work of the SIRA project during the last period has been devoted to coding and debugging programs that had been designed during previous mon's The work is now essentially complete and effective use of these programs is being made in the collection and analysis of instructional responses Programs providing data are GENO J A Easley and J Millar AUTOLAB SSCP Recursive Definitions H Wills QED R Stake and an Introduction to Arrays Nishida To date five experimental sessions have been conducted with University High-School Sub-Freshmen Certain revisions of the format and content of the program now seem indicated Preliminary examination of the data obtained through the use of program NEWSORT suggest 1 that during the same interval of time students perceived by the investigators as dealing effectively with the problem made many more moves key presses than students displaying difficulty and 2 those students having difficulty seemed inclined to try systematically each move in sequence while those students perceived as effective did not appear to be so constrained but instead seemed to develop an economical set of moves A consultation conference for the group was held in November 1966 Those in attendwere Dr Joe H Ward Jr Personnel Research Laboratory Lackland Air Force Base and Southwest Educational Development Corporation Dr Robert B Davis Director Madison Project Syracuse University and Webster College Mr Leander Smith Specialist in Programnmed Instruction Science Research Associates Dr Veryl Schult United States Office of Education Dr Joseph Murnin United States Office of Education Messrs Jason Millman Richard Salinger Brian Carss and the SIRA staff University of Illinois The conference provided a valuable interaction between the project staff and persons whose experience in curriculum development and computer technology was different from and deeper than theirs PROOF The mathematical problem-solving PLATO program PROOF while not completely debugged is in operating condition for algebraic proofs It has not been tested for logical or geometrical proofs as yet The lemma mode works under some conditions A comment mode has been added SOME SIRA PLATO PROGRAMS TUDOPE is program which provides summary information about student responses to the tutorial logic Information may be plotted on the PLATO screen or printed Information is in the form of lists of student responses and response latencies or histogram plots Histogram plots may be across students or across items All plots contain information about the following ARITHDRILL A new version of ARITHDRILL has been designed which will be easier to modify for experimental purposes than the old version In addition dope analysis will be more flexible and efficient and certain irremediable ambiguities in the data collected by the old version will be removed Program writing is currently proceeding minimum maximum mean 31 time per item number of trials per item number of errors judged wrong item I r4 Tudope was designed to process BCD dope tapes containing only student key mode and timp Infnrmation A vernion which will process binary dope tapes has not been completed I DO DAD Diagnostic Output Data Addition Device Given most CATO programs this program is intended to alter the CATO program and create a temporary version which will output on the printer the names of all calcs called subsequent to each key that is pressed Names and values of student bank values which are altered in the calcs are also printed Modified Tutorial A modification of the tutorial logic has been made which outputs additional XDOPE dope including A labelled uump of common non-zero values is optional 1 Current Main or Help page number The program is intended for use in debugging and or interpreting CATO programs The program is currently being code checked 2 Current question number on each page 3 Trial number increased upon each new attempt to respond to a question MOVIE 4 Time in Help or Comment mode Output upon each reentry to Tutor mode MOVIE is a PLATO program designed to act as a supplement to other programs where short animated films are needed It permits students to view slides at variable speeds 5 Judge result Yes No or SP are coded 1 2 or 3 upon each legal press of the Judge key 6 BCD Response Each key which has a BCD equivalent is recorded in BCD code A listing of this dope BYTE would provide a listing of all student responses and comments without the need for translation NEWSORT NEWSORT is an analysis program by which an author can select subsets of stored response parameters in which all the records of keypushes have some common characteristics or combination of characteristics e g all the keypush records for the student at a certain station or only particular keys for that student Subsets of subsets may also be requested and can be re-ordered by the ascending values of any of the response parameters In addition point graphs of iay response parameter vs any other response parameter may be requested The records and the graphs are shown on the 7 Legal Flag distinguishes legal keys from illegal keys in calc Keys illegal in the current mode may be distinguished by the absence of extra dope legal key coded 2 calc illegal key coded 1 mode illegal key implied code 0 PLATO screen but can be obtained in hard copy by request Special effects were also added to this version of the tutorial logic one of which provides a timing device which may be used to force a student into the Help mode after a predetermined amount of time has been spent on a question in the main sequence without the occurrence of a correct response to the question A second special effect permits the author to enter questions in the main sequence from the keyset These questions are plotted on the student's screen and may be a tered or deleted without modification to the slides SOME OPERATIONAL DETAILS IN THE PLATO GROUP CDC 1604 Computer Operations Period September 1 1966 to February 28 1967 Total Running Time Average Per Day 7 day week 2387 70 hours 13 19 hours Operational Time 95 74% 2286 05 hours Preventive Maintenaice Time 4 26% This version of the tutorial logic is currently operative 32 101 65 hours Engineering Time 0 00% Emergency Maintenance Time 9 O•% 0 00 hours programs CHARPLT and BDPLST and a new 0 00 hours subroutine GETPUTN have been added to the CATO master The binary mode doping method in use for several months has been successfully tested by student runs SYSTEMS PROGRAMMING CATO the PLATO Compiler MONSTER an Editing System CATORES resident program for CATO programs has been revised to include modifications in the plot and selective erase routines In addition SPECTRE Simulation Program Executing CATO Transcribed Re-Runs has been completely rewritten using the new doping format Improved features of SPECTRE permit the user 1 to proceed at various speeds and 2 to construct new dope tapes with additional information from previous student runs MONSTER Multiple Operator Nifty Student Terminal Editing Routine has been developed to provide PLATO users with a fast flexible time-shared program-editing system Flexibility is accomplished through a variety of magnetic-tape manipulations such as PLATOFORMAT text construction special listings and inserts from paper tape PLATO student terminals are utilized as the basic editing input media as well as providing editors with immediate feedback to the various edit commands Currently three users may share the system Improvements in the resident and the CATO compiler have been made The new service Classification and Indexing at Tlie Office of Standard Reference Data Nalrou'd 111' nil I rd d II'l Jhiug m 'It 202 td d be a device that when triggered by an inquiry identifies the subclass of items within a class of items that applies to the subject of the inquiry An inquiry is a question directed to an information system that requires the index to locate a particular item from the collection if there is one that satisfies the inquiry Classification and Indexing proved to be the most controversial topic on the agenda of the Discussion Forum of the Operators of Data and Information Centers associated with the NBS Office of Standard Reference Data which was held at the Bureau Classification and ndexiug of information and data are basic requirements for the efficient operation of an information service One segment of such a service is its data file operation The objective of this operation is to organize the collection of data and information by means of a classification and indexing system so as to provide ready and efficient retrieval of data and information to answer competently properly structured queries Properly designed a classiflcatioi and indexing system can minimize the work involved in negative searches by readily identifying those subjects not within its collection Conventional libraries rely on author and subject indexing as well as classification as a principal means of retrieval The preparation of author indexes is straightforward the design of subject indexes however can be very complex There are two basic approaches single access indexing and coordinate or conjunctive indexir g The standard index found In the back of a book is typical of the single access approach Such an index limits the method of searching to one term at a time The coordinate index on the other hand permits searching for information that can be characterized by a number of terms in conjunction Classification is a technique by which documents and information are fitted into a preestablished scheme The essence of classification is to design the scheme so that the one most suitable class of items is placed into a group by virtue of its role within the scheme Consider for example the inquiry Give me information on the effect of gamma irradiation on the adsorption pectrum of potassium permanganate solutions In the single access index the searcher will search one of the terms first probably potassium permanganate The index will loevte all items that discuss potasslum pernianganate in any sense whatever The Indexing is a technique for locating and retrieving items from a collection It may also 33 searcher must screen these documents and discard those items not related to gamma irradiation ettects on its absorption spectrum Similar searches may have to be performed for the remaining Important terms in the inquiry Use of the coordinate index on the other hand requires only one search the searcher will look for all three terms potassium permanganate absorption spectrum and gamma irradiation in conjunction A coordinate index locates only those items indexed by all three terms of the search thus eliminating most of the manual screening inherent in single access indexes There are various coordinate indexes in use today and such approaches lend themselves to mechanization problem than that of indexing contents to permit rapid location of individual data points A classification scheme for shelving does not need to have a large number of partitions of the subject matter Factors that should not be ignored in deciding the number and size of the partitions are the needs of the user his familiarity with the shelving system and his subjective reactions while browsing For this reason the approach to shelving holdings at the Office of Standard Reference Data emphasizes the needs of those who use the file for browsing - the professional staff of the Office Eight classification categories are used 1 General With a universe of about a million substances and more than a thousand properties however even the coordinate indexing approach faces a very formidable problem in the NSRDS indexing requirements 2 Nuclear properties 3 Atomic and molecular properties 4 Solid state properties In the present early stages of development and restricted resources the Office of Standard Reference Data can respond only in a limited way to inquiries Its response is based on the contents of its data file or referrals to knowledgeable individuals at the Bureau or at associated data centers Its data file comprises approximately 25 NSRDS and related publications and 800 worldwide physical property data compilations Within the next year the number of NSRDS and related publications is expected to double and the number of other compilations to increase 50 percent 5 Thermodynamics and transport properties 6 Chemical kinetics 7 Colloid and surface properties 8 Mechanical properties of materials This partitioning results in groups that contain at present an average of 150 items Furthei subject breakdowns are being explored on the basis of utility to the user At present it appears that more than one scheme of classification may be required In particular nuclear properties data cannot be subdivided on the basis of chemical substance classes like organic and inorganic whereas the other categories subdivide fairly well on the basis of chemical substance The present approach is to accept this difficulty as a fact and to institute a separate scheme for subdividing nuclear data - by dividing property data on the basis of timedependent and stationary states Additional subdivisions of the file will be developed as the need arises with the increased file size The initial classification and indexing procedures used for tie publications collected by the Office of Standard Refereuce Data are exploratory steps toward what is expected to be a large mechanized system The difficulty in developing classification and indexing nystems that withstand the test of file growth tirie and complexity is recognized For this reason the experimental nature of the present effort is emphasized As no existing widely-used classification scheme is satisfactory for NSRDS needs it is necessary to develop a new scheme The present small size of the file and its highly specialized nature and use are important factors that make it reasonable to devise a clasoification system suited to the particular needs of the Office of Standard Reference Data The present approach is intended to do this and at the same time to maintain flexibility to change as the system changes The first and primary indexing task of the Office of Standard Reference Data is to develop reference terms to aid in locating specific data on the physical properties of well-defined substances In a collection of approximately 800 compilations it is not an arduous task even without indexing aids to locate data points when a specific property and substance are cited As the number of inquiries increases however time-saving indexes should be of significant Classifying publications to provide for a shelf location and for convenient browsing should be considered a somewhat different 34 I w h 1 -fo r properties by substance and or a list of substances by a stated property value or set of values is demircd 2 A sigie pass through a compilation is not sufficient to obtain all terms 3 An open ended inventory ot terms would be a useful aid to the indexing operation The task of indexing in-depth Identifying each data point a collection of 800 items that grows at the rate of 400 items per year would be an overly ambitious undertaking at this time In-depth indexing of the NSRDS publication collection which contains less than 25 items and which Is now growing at the rate of 25 items per year is feasible however when considered as a pilot operation to determine more exactly the needs and capabilities of the Office This approach should provide more information on the magnitude of the task immediate assistance for responding to inquiries and should indicate future directions for exploration as greater numbers of inquiries are handled The proposed system will attempt to define a data point by physicl property and substance terms These guidelines teutify to the inherent difficulties of indexing even a limited and fairly well defined collection such as the one held by the Office of Standard Reference Data One of the first objectives will be to develop a method to identify rapidly those questions for which there is no answer in the file Significant effort can be saved if file searches that will yield negative results can be identified at the outset A thoroughly indexed collection of data points should provide this capability It may be meaningless to speak of an optimum indexing system as future demands on the system are undefined and at present cannot be known Nevertheless a well conceived and implemented indexing effort will be necessary to the successful operation of an inquiry service particularly where the system is flexible and able to incorporate changes as the situation dictates The Office of Standard Reference Data is hopeful that its approach to the indexing problem will yield a useful and flexible system Initial efforts to index the NSRDS data compilations indicate that in-depth indexing of pr' perties and materials should be based on the following guidelines 1 Subject matter knowledge is essential for adequate indexing General-Purpose Code System for Scientific Documents N aintmal Bumm wuntimlrd% 11 a hinglmld D C 2027 1 Blanton C Duncan of the Chemical Therinodynamics Data Group National Standard Reference Data System is responsible for the development of the taxywriter which is a modified tape typewriter for use as an input device for the preparation of machine-readable records With this device he is attempting to record scientific text in machine language providing accurate representation of the nonnumeric portions Mechanization in file preparation offers considerable advantages For instance a single abstract generally yields ten or more hanawritten file cards Each of these cards contains information which is largely identical to that on every other card of the set In a mechanized system where the set of cards for each abstract is machine generated and printed an analyst need mark only the abstract and is spared manual preparation of each file card This saves a considerable amount of professional staff time produces legible file cards and provides data in form suitable for manipulation and search in a mechanized system The taxywriter is a principal component of a system whose primary objective is to improve by mechanization the day-by-day operations of the Chemical Thermodynamics Data Group activity This mechanized system should prove valuable in the preparation of copy for computeraided piblication but its primary use here is to improve the efficiency of producing and using files of 3 x 5 cards The continued usefulness of a manual file system for rapidly and easily locating single data points and for critical evaluation of data entries should not be underestimated The purpose of mechanizing basic data and reference files is to enable 1 the scientist to prepare his written material with rminimum interference to his usual recording method 2 an ordirary typist to work at a familiar device that requires no special training of the oparator and 35 3 the digitizing of the recorded information for machine use at the first typing underscoring and overstriking The byproduct paper tape contains a record that enables a computer to develop the exact image of the typewritten page including all graphic elements used in their proper coordinate location The taxywriter accomplishes these objectives by providing the machine function of a man-machine input system that minimizes demands upon the man scientist or typist while augmenting his effort efficiently at low initial cost The manuscript image is stored by the computer in a general purpose scientific document code After retrieval from this storage the manuscript image can be output to the taxywriter to a high speed printer with approximately 200 graphics and to photocomposition devices The scientist records what he wishes with the full range of scientific symbolism to which he is accustomed Greek alphabet brackets special symbols mathematical notation The typist prepares typewritten copy exactly duplicating the handwritten manuscript with the aid of familiar type face units individually inserted at the platen Half spacing in the vertical direction permits the typist to join brackets to make super and subscripts and special symbols Back spacing provides a variety of graphics by Although this system was developed to meet specific needs of the Chemical Thermodynamics Data Group the general charac#Qr of the input device the use of a generalized code and the variety of output devices suggest that broader usage is possible and feasible Naval Training Device Center Rewarh Tol Vigihal fnpultr 'u-dity r1and EIalid 72813 On April 14 1967 the Naval Training Device Center terminated the operation of UDOFTT Universal Digital Operational Flight Trainer Tool after seven years of service and 21 008 hours of operation Simultaneously a contract has been let for a replacement for UDOFTT a new Research Tool Digital Computer Facility This system will incorporate a modern general purpose digital computer and associated peripheral equipment a large analog computer for hybrid problems and a fixed wind cockpit and a helicopter cockpit with associated motion systems Fig 1 This will provide NTDC with a versatile in-house capability for future computer and trainer research fer of training studies and mathematical investigations into characteristics of numerical integration formulas It has been the forerunner and prototype of digital simulators for aircraft submarines and other military training systems including multi-cockpit training simulators activated by a single digital general purpose computer The new computer system will consist of a Scientific Data Systems SIGMA 7 central processor with 16 000 32 bit words of directly accessible core memory The SIGMA 7 has a memory cycle time of 850 nanoseconds full word add in 1 8 microseconds and full word multiply in 4 9 microseconds The system features memory protection a floating point arithmetic unit priority interrupt system and dynamic memory mapping Additional storage consists of two magnetic tape units 60 000 byte sec transfer rate and a 1 5 million word capacity disk system 188 000 bytes see transfer rate Peripheral equipment includes a 600 line per minute buffered line printer a 400 card per minute card reader and 300 card per minute caed punch paper tape reader and punch and a keypunch UDOFTT which was completed in 1959 was the first successful general purpose type digital computer activated flight simulator It was designed by the Moore School of Electrical Engineering University of Pennsylvania and built for NTDC by Sylvania This project developed numerous advances in this state of the computer art including dual magnetic core memories a five-phase clock system and a special high speed parallel serial adder Originally designed for the simulation of the F100 and F9F aircraft UDOFTT has since been used for the simulation of space surface ship subsurface fixed wing and rotary wing vehicles The simulation of these vehicles has been a part of investigations into the simplification of aerodynamic equations into control systems trans- The research tool also includes two cockpits with associated sound and motion systems One is a helicopter cockpit which was used with UDOFTT and is being modified for use with this system The other is a variable configuration 36 SII PRINTER TAPE READ TAPE PUNCH CARD READ CARD PNCH r DAT I - PROCURED - - -GOVERNMENT FURNISHED EOIUP Figure 1 - Naval Training Device Center Tool Digital Computer System fixed wing cockpit This will be modular in nature and flexible enough to provide a research tool mock-up of almost any fixed wing aircraft Its motion system Is a state-of-the-art system with motion limits of 15° in roll t15° in yaw 20° -100 In pitch yaw and pitch referenced about a variable remote center of gravity and 1 5 ft -0 5 ft in vertical heave AND Itesearchi permit variable configuration of this equipment A linkage system between the computer lab's two FlEAC 550 Analog computers and the SIGMA 7 will provide the Center with a modern hybrid computation facility The research tool system will be ulsed primanrly for training device and simulation research Areas of time sharing computer generated display and hybrid computation will be studied General purpose data processing will be performed on the system with possible future Centerwide usage via the time-shared mode with remote stations located throughout the Center The system is scheduled for completion by approximately December 1968 The interface system for the research tool is modular in design with emphasis on flexibility It consists of digital to analog and analog to digital conversion modules digital to synchro modules and digital tu discrete and discret to digital conversion modules A large central patchboard will provide communication and Advanced Inventory Control A Marine helicopter returning to a field hospital from an ambulance evacuation mission in South Vietnam loses ground radio contact 10 minutes short of touchdown Though it gets back to the hospital it cannot fly any more mis- sions without its transmitter The radioman can't repair it The 'copter supply shackdoesn't huwe a replacement Neither does the Naval Supply Depot at Subic Bay The request must be relayed to the states It comes to the Navy's 37 I Aviation Supply Office ASO in northeast Philadelphia which is responsible for the world-wide spare part support of Navy and Marine aircraft When an activity's assets fall below a reorder point the computer will met the wheels in motion for automatically redistributing material to the activity so that shortages can be balanced out with assets from other stock points or with purchases Based on a record of an activity's issues the computer also forecasts an activity's expected quarterly requirements Every three months the computers recompute these reorder points and project future requirements In a computer at ASO there is a combination of digits that will tell where the needed transmitter is stocked and punch out a shipping order to have It sent to South Vietnam Most of ASO's work is done with the discs drums and tapes of data processing They have become an invaluable aid to ASO' technical and administrative personnel In January 196'1 ASO expanded its computer capacity and standardized procedures In recent years ASO has operated one of the most advanced data processing systems intthe Department of Defense however stock status information for the computer lagged behind actual status at the time of the reading There has also been a lack of standardization of automated systems between ASO and other Naval activities outside of the Naval Aeronautical Supply System The new data processing system will close these gaps With this system says Commander Bob Austin Director of ASO's Data Processing Division we will be able to accelerate the movement of spares from the time they are purchased until they leave the system as excess obsolete or scrap In the second phase of the new program after July 1 computers will help to decide when to recall disposed material and where it is available They will provide instant information on outstanding procurements deciding if they should be cancelled or expedited They will compute average Navy and Commercial repair turnaround-times the time it takes for a repaired item to get back on the shelves They will work out averages on contract delivery time and on survival rates of repaired items Processing requisitions of course is one of the computer's most important jobs Requests for supplies come in by message phone mail and the AUTODIN network Until the recent expansion of automated techniques all requests except those sent by AUTODIN had to be sent to keypunch areas for translation to punched cards before the computers could handle them Today ASO's requisition center is tied into the computers with remote interrogaters With these units requisitions can be keyed directly to the computer This directness together with the capability of the computer to process the requisition ýmmediately speeds responsiveness to fleet requirements The movement of aviation material in the Navy Supply System is reported daily from 27 major stock points Receipts issues or other changes in stock status are transmitted to ASO as they occur over a wire network called AUTODIN These are fed daily to the ASO computer This is Transaction Item Reporting Previously these transactions although sent daily were not processed immediately Computer limitations hindered rapid updating of files With daily processing actual system status is furnished by the computer It Is never more than one day old This almost up-to-the-minute capability approaches a Real-Time reading This capa'•lity is a major system improvement The requisition for the helicopter transmitter was processed through the computer in three hours The end product of the processing was two punched cards that went to an AUTODIN transmitter One told the activity stocking the transmitter to ship it The other sent out the word along the network to the requesting activity that the item was on its way The record of movement of spares in the field is mixed and matched in computers with information on paperwork action at ASO to provide a complete picture of the status of material at both ends of the system To speed the traffic of business between ASO's personnel and the computers remote interrogators are being used in key locations throughout the organization These are similar to teletypewriters and are wired into a computer's circuits Inventory mangers buyers technical pernonnel and others can feed decisions to or extract information from the computer with these units Three hour processing is possible when a needed item is stocked somewhere in the systern When it is not the computer prints out an action form for ASO's commodity managers They will check Overhaul and Repair shops for repairable items to see if any of the items are being repaired If so the item will be expedited They will also check excess stocks of other services They will review contracts to see if the item is on order from a manufacturer and expedite completion of an emergency quantity if not arrangements will be made for purchase 38 1 I AMO's computers are put to work in all these says CDR Austin that these widely scattered actions storagc points will provide visibility as though they were one huge warehouse It will mean quicker response to the needs of the Navy's aircraft whether they be helicopters in Vietnam cargo carriers in the Antarctic or Phantom jets on an aircraftcarrierin the Mediterranean There are about a hundred stock points in ASO's distribution system reaching across the country and overseas ASO's computer library with its up-to-the-minute 'Real-Time' readings on stock status is so complete and current Centralized Data Processing 11radqurarten Nav vP1ayifr mit dle Rnge Point Mugiu alit •noi U30 Jj In the Newsletter of October 1966 an article entitled Navy Computer Systems described the use of computer capabilities by the Navy at Point Mugu The article contained an account of a study on future use of computers at Point Mugu by a committee appointed by Rear Admiral R N Sharp Range Commander The committee was headed by John F Donlan Deputy Plans and Resources Management Officer The Committee's objective was to improve significantly the effectiveness in acquiring controlling and utilizing the overall Point Mugu data processing capability Significant changes In function and organiization resulted from cornmittee recommendations had been Acting Head Test Data Division was named Deputy Data Processing Officer Following the committee's recommendations the Commander Pacific Missile Range directed the establishment of a new centralized data processing activity called the Data Processing Department The Department combined the data reduction processing and scientific problem solving facilities and personnel of the Range Operations Department's Test Data Division with the management data processing facilities and personnel of the Comptroller's Data Processing Division Mr Donlan was named Data Processing Officer and Mr Langford who Planning has been accomplished towards incorporation of the CDC-3 100 capability now with the Range Operations Department's Geophysics Division into the Data Processing Department This is being phased with the Navy's Civilian Substitution Program The Data Processing Department currently operates two IBM- 7094 Systems one IBM- 1401 computer and one IBM- 1460 unit In addition elements of the Department operate one Univac 642A computer plus two Univac 642B systems and one NCR-315 system The software responsibilities of the Department include the programming for the above mentioned systems plus Univac Model 1230 642B and 1218 systems located on Johnston Atoll at Barking Sands Kauai Hawaii and on the instrumentation ship USNS WHEELING Also in furtherance of the Five Year Plan mentioned in the October 1966 article action is underway to acquire third generation cornputer systems to replace several of the existing systems Mobile Medical Check-ups UJnier wiv y Soutiwr iinria 1 Ai eli• G al or r fiu 90007 Your complete medical check-up of the future may be as near as the computer-equipped van parked down the street a far-reaching medical and health information system which provide a variety of computerized medical testing and screening services in mobile clinics The study is financed under a contract with the Adult Health and Aging Branch U S Public Health Service That is the prediction of William R Larson Ph D University of Southern California corn outer and Eystems development expert who has begun work on the first phase of a bold ne' v concept to improve medical care The proposed system is under the direction of Dr Larson adjunct associate pi lessor of Public Administration and research associate at Rossmoor- Cortese Institute for the Study of Retirement and Aging both at USC He has launched a feasibility study of developmental approaches to what he envisions as 39 ' I A preliminary report would be issued to the vAiZL4 ee1v WLUIS eU111PICU2 rvipUxAisetth private physician The private physician on reviewing the data would decide if a visit were necessaiy If at anuy tihae the exanmlnee had to see a physician he would have a well ordered body of information which the physician could use as a guide to diagnosis and therapy The computer expert believes the revolu- uonary prupotsai wiii provide viriuAliy uniiani ed possibilities as a resource link in the chains of public and private health services Specifically he believes suLh a system could play vital roles in the provision of detailed information on patients for their private physiclans provision of materials for the continuing professional education of physicians and health education for laymen and furnishing otherwise unobtainable information for public health agencies All the information gathered in each individual test would be stored in a central information bank for later use by the public health agencies The proposed system conceived by Dr Larson originally for use in meeting the medical needs of elderly persons more adequately would be applicable as well he says to poverty area residents in need of better medical care for civil defense emergencies and to compile health information on the general population An expanded system could integrate such present day chores' as immunization programs and blood collection and distribution Foreseeable advantages of the system says Dr Larson are the high-speed analysis comparison and correlation capabilities of the computer and the fact that such a program would literally bring a clinic to elderly persons or others who would be either unable or unmotivated to travel distances for needed medical care This is how the proposed system as it is now envisioned would work By attaching transportable field hospital units developed for use in Vietnam the system would become an emergency hospital complete with staffed laboratories A series of vans constituting what is called a multiphasic screening clinic and containing the latest in computers with bio-medical capabilities would be set up for a period of time in a local neighborhood The feasibility study will be completed by January 1968 Rus service for shut-ins and elderly persons would be provided from their homes to the clinic site Each area resident would go through a series of stations at one for example having his blood sample analyzed by computer which would perform literally hundreds of tasks almost instantaneously At another station the person would have respiratory tests taken and the resuits analyzed Co-director of the project is Dr James Birren head of the Rossmoor-Cortese Institute The project staff includes Garst Reese a programmer at USC's Computer Sciences Laboratory Jon Greene a graduate student at USC and Karin Daley a research assistant 40 j