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CENTRALISED COMPUTERS

LOST CITY OF CAMBODIA

(Specially written for ft The Press’' by JOHN RICHARDS]

JT is inevitable that technological progress will cause the use of computers by industrial and commercial firms to become common and necessary to sustain competitive business life. Eventually all businesses, large and small, must face this situation.

The problem for the small or average-sized business is that its data-processing procedures, and the research, design, and business decision programme it will need are not necessarily small, and may need a computer just as large as that of the big company for their execution. The difference is that a big company may be able to keep a computer fully occupied, whereas the small company may need one for only a small fraction of the day. There is one possible way whereby present technological resources can be utilised to bridge the gap between the present requirements and the ideal solution of one large capacity computer per firm, that is, by the establishment of a centrally located computer centre, connected to terminal equipment in customers’ offices by telecommunications sets or Telex cable.

The equipment of a CECOMS central office could be: The telecommunications equipment (which provides the necessary facilities for reliable high-speed transmission of data through many channels); a switching computer controlling all input, computing, and output machines (in relation to customers’ requirements, by using multiprogramming techniques in order to serve a number of customers apparently simultaneously “time-sharing”); the input and output machines; small computers to check new programmes (“precompiling”), and to translate them into the machine language (“compiling”); the large computer executing customers’

Aj the effects of the automatic electronic computer upon our way of life continue to develop in both depth and variety, the need increases for those people who will control these machines to understand fully both their properties and their applications. For this reason the study of computers is now an integral part of their courses for many university students. A natural response to any educational programme, especially in a new subject, is the stimulation in those taught of their own ideas and the development of those ideas beyond the current stage of teaching in the subject. This is important, because it is these same students on whom depends the future progress of the subject, and it is their ideas, as they mature, on which that progress will be based.

John TV. Richards, an engineering student just completing his second professional year, has studied computers in his engineering course and become aware of some of the challenging problems in this sphere. In this article he has set out his own ideas on how they may be met. So fast does computer science move that some of them are already anticipated in current research programmes. Be that as it may: this is .one young mans glimpse of the shape of things to come.— B. A. Moon.

programmes by multi-pro-gramming; peripheral storage units giving efficiency of use of the main computer core memory, for example magnetic tape or magnetic card units; and test channels and equipment for testing newlyinstalled terminal equipment. CECOMS terminal equipment could consist of: input, output, and control devices, and a telecommunications set

Two types of CECOMS terminal offices could be used: those owned by companies, and those owned by the CECOMS company ( being conveniently located for public use around the city). A disadvantage of the system might be that, ar the number of users fluctuate during a day, overload could occur causing undesirable waiting time. During business hours complete priority timelisting of programmes would reduce the frequency of waiting for urgent results to a minimum.

Features and advantages of the CECOMS system would be: 1. Time-sharing techniques now in operation overseas allow the use of eight programmes at once, thus the CECOMS system could be similarly organised to cater for a maximum number of users, the total time

per programme being only slightly increased. For overnight work, or over weekends, a queue-record system could be used in the controlling computer, enabling the CECOMS system to process all required programmes in sequence outside business hours.

2. CECOMS terminal equipment could be economically and easily installed, used, and maintained, requiring a minimum of space and capital outlay. 3. The large capacity computers would execute the various large programmes that the users would require fairly frequently, yet the individual user-companies would not own the computers, and, in fact, each one could not justify, on economic grounds, the installation of such a computer, although eventually they may be able to, since the requirements and computer capabilities would be much better understood.

4. The time-sharing facilities of the CECOMS system would result in the computers initially installed being used to near-maximum capacity within a short-time of installation. This contrasts with overseas experiences where often companies ran a computer at a loss for nearly a year bef ore a break occurred. The inevitable increase in

demand could be met by addition of new equipment in the expandable equipment set-up, the ultimate limit of expansion for one CECOMS centre having been set by optimistic forecasts of future requirements.

5. It is practicable to interconnect CECOMS centres by high-speed data links of various kinds, hence there need never be any limit to the total expansion of such a system, even over the whole country. 6. Standard programmes often used could be stored in a central magnetic card storage unit. 7. In parallel with the computers an independently accessible multi-channel computer with large capacity magnetic card storage could be used for information storage and retrieval. 8. Recently developed computer languages are straight forward to learn and use, for example: FORTRAN 11, in two weeks.

9. The CECOMS company could organise computer programming courses in which selected staff members of companies installing terminal equipment or computers would learn all aspects of computer useage. This would ensure eventual maximum utilisation of the facilities available, as trained staff with imagination will increasingly find new uses of computers in removing work drudgery, in design techniques, and for business decision programmes, etc. Often when companies initially investigate computers, many ways of using them are not realised.

10. CECOMS programmers and systems analysts would be available for customers to hire.

11. The switching computer could be such that through it data could be transferred from one terminal office to another, with or without computer processing interposed. 12. The presence of a CECOMS system in any city would attract and encourage new industries and commercial enterprises to be established.

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19660212.2.123

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30983, 12 February 1966, Page 12

Word count
Tapeke kupu
1,080

CENTRALISED COMPUTERS LOST CITY OF CAMBODIA Press, Volume CV, Issue 30983, 12 February 1966, Page 12

CENTRALISED COMPUTERS LOST CITY OF CAMBODIA Press, Volume CV, Issue 30983, 12 February 1966, Page 12

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