Fifty Years Ago .... from the pages of Computer Weekly
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Spring 1972 computing, compiled by TNMOC volunteer archivist, Brian Aldous.
A selection of stories from Computer Weekly from the Spring of 1972. The full archive of Computer Weekly can be seen at TNMOC, where there are special rolling displays of front pages from 25 and 40 years ago.
Cassette and New Tape from EMI:
Two new high density tape products have been announced by Emitape Inc. The Datasette digital tape cassette carries 300 feet of tape and stores data at 1,600 bpi, while the type 6400 reel tape has a storage capacity of 6,400 flux changes per inch. In designing the Datasette great attention was paid to ensuring purity of recording. The casing is manufactured from high impact plastic and metallised to eliminate build-up of static charge, and all metal parts, including screws, are non-magnetic to avoid spurious recording signals on the tape. (CW 2/3/72 p8)
Two firsts in Europe at Paris Airport:
What is claimed to be the first computer-controlled air conditioning system in Europe is now in operation at Paris-Orly airport, France. The computer and associated control console, supplied by the French Telemecanique company, make use of 400 information sources, measuring and controlling water temperature and pressure, flows and pump speeds for the entire airport complex, including the new West Terminal passenger building, completed last summer as phase II in the airport development. Also a first in Europe is the air cooled condenser system serving part of the airport’s refrigeration plant. This system, originally installed in 1965 by Brissonneau-York, a French based affiliate of the York International Division of Borg-Warner, has now been increased in capacity by the addition of York Turbo compressors to a total of 4,400 tons of refrigeration. (CW 2/3/72 p9)
£1.3m RAF order for Cossor terminals:
One of the largest single orders ever placed in the UK for terminal equipment has been won by Cossor Electronics. The order, which is valued at £1.3 million, covers the supply of over 1,000 terminal units comprising 450 VDUs and 572 character printers for use in a stores management system being developed for the RAF. The system is being developed at RAF Hendon and the main contract for terminal equipment has been awarded to Cossor following the success of a £35,000 evaluation order for 16 displays. As well as the visual units, which are to be DIDS 402Es, and character printers, Cossor will supply 97 fanout control units and 47 printer sharing devices. When the project is completed every RAF establishment in the UK handling stores will be equipped with a terminal. As revealed more than a year ago the system is to be driven by two ICL System 4/72 computers back-to-back, and these will provide round the clock control of stores. (CW 9/3/72 p1)
Supermarket check-out terminal for Britain:
The supermarket check-out is not the place to go to without any cash, or so one would have thought. But now a retail point-of-sale terminal called ASTROS has been brought to this country by MSI Data Corporation of California, at which the check-out clerk does not enter prices, but only the code for the goods. The terminal, linked to a computer, records the right price according to the number of each item purchased or its weight. Moreover, optional extras with ASTROS include an on-line weighing machine and a cheque writing unit. With the latter the customer hands over a cheque and the unit fills in the payee details, date and total and then all the customer has to do is to sign it. However, just in case anyone should be so old-fashioned as to want to pay in cash the terminal does have an electronically operated money drawer. (CW 9/3/72 p8)
BEA first customer for SITA network:
With the inauguration of a data link between Rome and London, British European Airways has become the first of the world’s airlines to use the SITA High Level Network, described in last week’s issue, for transmitting seat reservation data. A significant aspect to this development is the fact that BEA had concluded that it was not economical to rent a dedicated line at a cost of £18,000 a year, to link the limited number of terminals at their Rome sales office to the Beacon computer centre in London. However, availability of the SITA service which provides a high-level link at a line cost of only £4,500 a year, made it economically practicable to do this. In fact, the Rome office is the first of 22 BEA sales offices throughout Europe which will be linked, via the SITA High Level Network, to the airline’s £8 million Univac 494 computer centre during 1972. (CW 9/3/72 p9)
Revolutionising the Newspapers:
A cathode ray tube phototypesetting system, which, according to its manufacturers, may revolutionise newspaper production and cut composing costs, has been developed in the US by Seaco Computer Display Inc, of Garland, Texas. The Seaco system, known as the Model 1601 CRT, can be used to define the type size and heading for each story and its location. It can also place heads with the stories and ensure that they fit within the parameters defined. Advertisements are not only fully coded for typesetter output but their location is coded with exact XY coordinates. The Seaco system is capable of typesetting an entire newspaper in one single pass on the CRT in about 50 per cent reduction. This page then has to be enlarged before printing. Cost of the new system is less than $200,000. (CW 9/3/72 p16)
Fatigue Testing Concorde past endurance:
The structures testing hangar at the Royal Aircraft Establishment at Farnborough is given over completely to the fatigue testing of a full-size Concorde assembly, but the building and the machinery it contains are built on such a vast scale that the mighty aircraft inside is lost by comparison. In order to simulate the exacting conditions of supersonic flight, the whole aircraft structure is covered with hydraulic jacks and with heating and cooling ducts to such an extent that only the wingtips and the top of the fin are visible. The hydraulic jacks apply loading stresses and the various heating and cooling ducts serve to set up thermal stresses similar to those encountered in flight. In order that structural defects shall show up first in the test rig rather than in aircraft in flight, the simulated stresses are applied three times more often than they are likely to be experienced in operation. As well as the fatigue tests being carried out at Farnborough and the in-flight tests using the prototype aircraft, static tests are being conducted at Toulouse in France where a Concorde structure is subjected to conditions 50 per cent more severe than those encountered in the air. Besides the problems of mechanical stress, the Concorde designers had to bear in mind the considerable thermal stresses set up early in any one flight because the outer shell of the aircraft heats up more quickly than the interior of the hull. Conversely, when the aircraft comes to a halt, the interior is at a higher temperature than the exterior. The shell of the Concorde is therefore continually exposed to cycles of thermally produced stress. (CW 16/3/72 p1)
Varian 620/L Aids Research into Diagnostic Pictures:
Dramatic improvements in the quality of diagnostic pictures may be expected from a three-year research project just beginning in the Clinical Physics and Bio-Engineering Department of Scotland’s Western Regional Hospital Board in Glasgow. Using a Varian 620/L minicomputer, the first to come out of Varian Associates’ new Scottish factory at Donibristle, the research will aim to “clean up” pictures obtained from ultrasonic equipment, isotope scanning equipment and infra-red thermography, all techniques which have been added to the best known diagnostic aid of this kind, X-rays. Some of the early work in ultrasonics has been useful in obstetrics, as a more efficient way of diagnosing multiple births than by using X-rays, but ultrasonic diagnosis has been hampered by the poor quality of the pictures, which have a fuzziness caused by the equipment rather than by the patient. (CW 16/3/72 p20)
OCR fount gets US acceptance:
After revision by the European Computer Manufacturers Association, the OCR-B fount which is widely used in Europe but has been spurned in the US, has now gained acceptance from the American National Standards Institute, an outcome which once seemed unlikely. The revised fount – the second edition of Standard ECMA-11 on OCR-B – includes changes to the numeral zero and the upper-case letters O and D to make them more easily distinguishable. An important point in view of the wide use of numeric subsets is that both the old and new designs for zero can be distinguished from the other numerals at little extra cost and without significant deterioration of machine performance. The Size II fount has been deleted due to a lack of interest in it, and a Size IV, which is particularly suited to credit and identity card applications, has been introduced. It has the same aspect ratio as Size I and can be derived from it by linear magnification. The original Standard ECMA-II has been the subject of an International Standards Organisation recommendation since 1969, but its use has largely been confined to Europe. In the US it was felt that the stylised OCR-A fount was acceptable and that OCR-B, which has a more conventional appearance, would not be so efficiently recognised by machines. (CW 23/3/72 p8)
Memorex enters Mainframe Business:
A new contender has come into the mainframe business with the announcement in the US that Memorex, formerly known primarily for its disc packs and plug-compatible peripherals, is introducing two commercial data processing systems. The computers, known as the MRX/40 and 50, are the first of an IBM compatible range which will eventually comprise four machines. Both will be offered in multiprocessor configurations with emphasis on the use of large disc storage capacity and comprehensive telecommunication facilities, but with the needs of the smaller commercial user in mind. The machines are fitted with MOS semiconductor memory, the MRX/40 having a storage capacity of 16K to 64K bytes while the MRX/50 is available with 16K to 128K bytes. A full range of peripheral equipment is available and systems can be equipped with from 29 million to 232 million bytes of on-line exchangeable disc storage. (CW 30/3/72 p1)
M-way signals system now operational:
The first section of the new centrally controlled and computer monitored national motorway signalling system became operational last week on 85 miles of the M6 and M62 in Cheshire, Lancashire and Yorkshire. When this national system is fully operational, 30 police control offices will be able to handle the signals on the whole of the motorway network through six unattended computer centres. The total cost of the section now open was £600,000 and the main contractors were GEC-Elliott Traffic Automation, which supplied control offices and the computer system, and Plessey, which supplied the equipment on the motorways. For this section a computer centre at Westhoughton, Lancashire, containing two MARCH 9050 computers, one of them in a stand-by role, is controlling 164 motorway signals. (CW 6/4/72 p1)
Powerful PDP-16M introduced by DEC:
A low cost minicomputer, aimed at both OEM and end user applications in data logging, machine control and communications processing, is the latest item to come out of the Digital Equipment stable. Known as the PDP-16M, it sells for a basic price of £935. The PDP-16M eliminates the hard-wired back panel architecture of its predecessor the PDP-16 and replaces it with more flexible programmable read only memory (PROM). Commenting on the introduction of the new machine, Mr Ian Follows, PDP-16 manager for the UK, told Computer Weekly, “The 16M is four times more powerful than the PDP-8e and it is particularly suitable for dedicated applications.” (CW 13/4/72 p3)
IBM announce two systems to fight pollution:
With pollution a burning issue these days, IBM is losing no opportunity to win any public sympathy that’s going, and following the announcement of an atmospheric model system for New York City comes news of two more systems for the ecologist. In Atlanta, Georgia, a water pollution control system based on an IBM System 7 was demonstrated at the Society of Manufacturing Engineers Convention in February. The system employs sensors which are placed in a river both above and below the plant or city. When the sensors record the approach of predetermined pollution limits, the valves on pipes leading into the river from aerating tanks containing partially processed waste are automatically closed. IBM claims that the time element is the big advantage of the system over present methods. “At present, action is not usually taken until a fish kill is spotted, or a violation has occurred. By then the harm is done. Another feature of the system is that "the same method . . . can also be used to monitor and control air and noise pollution.” In Missouri, a research project sponsored by the US Coast Guard is using an IBM360/50 to predict oil spill movements in the open sea, which will enable the Coast Guard to mobilise their clean-up resources before the oil hits the beaches, and to enable the perpetrator to be traced if there is any doubt about who it was. (CW 13/4/72 p14)
Marconi completes first phase MARS: Phase one of a £750,000 computer-based message switching system called MARS (Marconi Automatic Relay System), which will link the Meteorological Centre at Bracknell with other major world centres, has been completed by Marconi Communication Systems Ltd for the Ministry of Defence. MARS links Bracknell as a Regional Telecommunications Hub to the main trunk circuit of the World Weather Watch network first planned in 1967. Each centre on the circuit has responsibility for collecting, collating and re-transmitting weather information from its own area to the nearest centres on the circuit, and will receive information from them in turn. Bracknell is linked to the World Meteorological Centre in Washington on the West, and to Regional Telecommunications Hubs in Paris and Offenbach, near Frankfurt, on the East. Moscow and Melbourne are the other two World Centres, and other hubs are situated in Prague, Cairo, New Delhi and Tokyo. Bracknell will collect weather information on 50 bps lines from outstations in an area including the United Kingdom, Ireland, Iceland, Greenland, Gibraltar, the Netherlands, and four Ocean Weather Stations as well as from merchant shipping in the Eastern Atlantic. (CW 20/4/72 p20)
CASE launches TV terminal:
A computer terminal that can display sales graphs, share price charts, process flow diagrams and a wide range of graphical data that is handled in commerce, finance and engineering has been announced by Computer And Systems Engineering. Called the CASE Computek 300, the system can display 1,050 alphanumeric characters with an unlimited number of vectors on a 256 by 256 grid which permits the drawing of straight lines and smooth curves on any part of the screen. A feature of the system is its use in conjunction with television. It can be used to drive television monitor screens as display repeaters, and it can also accept picture signals from TV cameras or video cassettes for simultaneous display with the internally generated lines and characters. A direct access memory technique allows the display to be refreshed 50 times a second and dispenses with the storage tube often used in similar systems. The system gives a very bright display and allows individual vectors and characters to be updated without erasing the rest of the screen. (CW 27/4/72 p18)
Ferranti digitising system attracts interest at Cadex:
A great deal of interest was shown at the Cadex 72 exhibition in Southampton last week in Ferranti’s new interactive Freedraft system, a computer-based digitising system. It is a flexible design work station, designed to act independently or on-line to a large main frame computer. The system consists of a Freescan digitiser with a graphics display to display what the user has been digitising, together with a dedicated 8K PDP-8 with two 32K disc storage units. Depending on whether or not on-line editing is required, Ferranti says that up to three or four digitising tables might be linked to the sane PDP-8. (CW 4/5/72 p4)
GEC launches larger real time machine:
Following the introduction of the GEC 2050 at last year’s Datafair, GEC-Elliott Automation has chosen its “World of Automation” exhibition which begins today, Thursday, at Borehamwood as the occasion for the announcement of the second in its current range of real time computers, the larger GEC 4080. The new machine, which is designed for medium to large industrial and military automation and control applications and features a high level assembly language called Babbage, was developed by GEC-Elliott Automation’s subsidiary, GEC Computers. The GEC 4080 can have from one to four processors, uses bipolar MSI technology, and is capable of speeds approaching one million operations a second. The processors are designed to operate on a wide range of data types, from byte-oriented communications data to 64-hit floating point formats, and have a built-in multiplexer providing up to 256 autonomous I/O channels. (CW 4/5/72 p20)
IBM mark reader for 370s and System 3:
Another piece of equipment, this time an optical mark reader, designed for use with 370 machines and System 3, but which cannot be used in 360 configurations, has been introduced by IBM. The unit, the 3881, handles documents from three inches square to 9 by 12 inches at speeds up to 6,000 documents an hour, double the reading speed of its predecessors. The 3881 was launched at Hanover Fair and first deliveries from IBM’s Greenock, Scotland, factory are scheduled to start by the middle of next year. Price of the unit will start from £27,000, and rental on a 24-month contract will be £566 a month. The 3881 supersedes two models, the 1232 off-line unit which outputs to a card punch, and the 1231 on-line model, which has versions for 1130 and 1400 machines and for the 360. (CW 11/5/72 p1)
Brain disease diagnosis eased with EMI machine:
An important breakthrough in the investigation of brain diseases has been achieved by EMI Electronics and Industrial Operations, using a number of X-ray detectors linked to a minicomputer which digitises their readings and produces a composite picture of a “slice” of a patient's brain only about 1 cm thick. The machine rotates round a patient’s head taking 56,000 readings from a narrow beam of X-rays passing through the head in a single plane. The readings are digitised and the minicomputer solves 28,000 simultaneous equations and builds the results up in the form of a 160 by 160 picture matrix. (CW 18/5/72 p7)
Reader will handle all types of Cards:
A card processing system designed to read any type of punched card has been introduced by Contemporary Electronics Ltd, of Aldershot, Hampshire. Available as optional extras, to work on-line to the card reader, are a small line printer, magnetic tape unit and a modem interfacing unit. Based on photoelectric techniques, the card reader forms the basis of the system which incorporates vacuum card feeding in which card wear and tear is reduced by controlled-tension card pressure rollers. The reading speed is 400 cpm. The reader, which sells at £998, will handle all punched or blackmarked cards, including 80-column cards, plastic credit cards, IBM System 3 96-column cards, and any other data carrying card which does not exceed the dimensions of the standard 80-column card. (CW 25/5/72 p1)