ATTACHMENTS TO SECTION 8

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00077R000100060005-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 28
• Document Creation Date: December 23, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 15, 2012
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: March 3, 1987
• Content Type: MISC

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
UNCLASSIFIED COPY ~oF 2~
ATTACHMENTS
TO
SECTION 8
3 MARCH 1987
UNCLASSIFIED
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15: CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
The following attachments are referenced in section 8 of the basic
do~~ument. They are provided as additional supporting material for the review
of bar code readers, local area networks, and data base systems.
Attachment Name
A Portable Bar Code Readers
B Tethered Bar Code Readers
C IEEE Standard 802.3
D Builder Picks Lan Over Mainframe
E Cost Comparison (Mainframe/Lan)
F Network Standard
G Companies Use PC LAN for Tasks Formerly done By Minis
H Wang Hurt By Closed Architecture
I Listing of Inventory Systems
J Software Comparison
K R:BASE: The Promise Expressed
L Selected Bibliography
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15: CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
Prot'.
Model 1'IUyramTning Host
PORTABLE Bar Code Readers
Max Sccn Mel Data Mem Test
Mem Slze Time Connection Low Rslt k:PROM Price --.'-Laser
MSIPUII
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Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15: CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
Tethered Bar Code Readers
Max Scrn Mem Data Rug-
Read
Dlst Pclce
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12k 10 years
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Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15: CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15: CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers has been involved
with developing standards for computers and communications for several years.
They are recognized as the most important standards group in these areas and
have more accepted standards in the area than any other group.
IEEE 802.3 Standard
This standard specifies the minimum specifications for an Ethnet
interface, at layers 1 and 2, and part of layer 3 of the International
Standards Organziation (ISO) model for Open Systems Interconnect (OSI). The
ISO OSI model is a seven layer model for specifying standard communications
procedures. Each Layer represents a different function that is required for
communications between "nodes." Anode can be a computer or a communications
device.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15: CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
~ ~~ :.
~ ~ ~~ ~~
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~~
U1N Foats: Getaway Optfona and 386AT Sarver, Paga C/22
Revkw: Attacfurtata Takea on .BM, DCA Emulator, Papa C. 29
Ezplenatlorc Banker Trvat Ptrta Trutt h T1 Unaa, Papa C/J2
Builder Picks LANs Over Mainframe
By Paul Bonner
Buk in 192J, when Roland C.
Tannerof Phornu, Anz., started
hu road?butlding business, his
employed consisted of a team of
oxen and his equipment was a
wooden scraper for the oxen to
drag over the dusty Arizona
esrth.
At the time, his data-processing
needs probably weren't two co~~
plea. The company has groan a
bit since thrn, however. Today,
Tanner Soutbwdt u the second-
largest privately held firm in Ati?
zone, with some 2,500 employed
and projected saki of SJ00 m;i?
hoe for fiscal yea 1987.
Tanner Southwest Inc. has
been in the rotd?building business
for 64 yeas. Today, it's blazing
new tt'atls in the informauon?pro-
casting uea by embulting on 1 '
bold plan that will move all the
company's computer resoures 'I
from mainfr-md to PC-based
LAVs auhin five yeah.
Tanner Southwdt's informa?
tion?processing requirements
have groan in land. Along wnh '
the standud complemrn[ Jf word
processing, messaging and other
otFice-automanon tasks, the coin- i
parry leans heavily on a number of ~
tghly spectaltzed software sys? ~,
terns tt consider cnuai to Its
livelihood. These include a pro7?
eet-scheduling system used -~ i
several of the company's dive- I
lions, a cost?esumaung system '.
used by its conswcuon divslc::.
a truck dispatching system used ~
by i[s concrete division and 1 ~
complex accounting system. ~
Hove hom :Mainframes ~
As might be expected in a coin- ~
parry of Tanner Southwest's size, I
most of those cnucal systems re?
side on a mainframe-in Tanners I
cue, a leased I8M ~tJ81 wnh 16b1
i bycd of RAN and 10 gigabytd ci
on-line storage-and most
employee access those systems
enher through 3278 terminals cr
PCs equipped with J270 em~~l~
tion cards. i
That will change in the near fu-
ture, however. Ron Tanner. Ro- ~
I land Tanner's grandson and the
company's manager of systems
' and programming, believes that
within 5ve years all the ,ompa?
ny's computer systems can be
moved to network-based PCs.
Based on the company's tar
'~ year of ezpcnence wuh Xovell
~ `etWare running on Arcnet
~ hudware, "[ think everyone
~ around here would agree that the ~
networks have proven them-
. wives," qtr. Tanner vld.
i{C 1d.:G~: thu he be::eva T.ic~
ntC ~JUthw eSt '~;u ylin In: rtllt_
pent T:lnCG. d1a SGC C.^.; j. ~1r~. .
w 1rG ft1:1b1, 1tY Ind ~1i:~.': ...
' CftlSed :Oat1 trOm t:1e iw lt_:1J~C'
' tfJm a mlln trlme?bivt4 S~C:e.^..
' to one dominated by PC L.4~s
Currently. Tanner Southwezt
j has approximately .00 3:78 and
).76 terminals and )00 PCs.
About 80 percent of the compa?
ny's PCs ue connected to one . i
I its half dozen LAtis (whits
S
range in siu from 80-plus PCs at
=PCs a Its headgturten to flue or su PCs
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
At Tanner Southwest, Mainframe Heads
For Scrap Heap; PC LANs To Take Over
n a construction-site trailer), and about 75
xrcent of the: PCs rngage in communica-
ions with the: mainframe.
The lease on the mainframe expires in
ess than three years, and the company
ioesn't intend to renew u. Instead, most of
he current mainframe applications will be
roved to PC networks. The company's ac-
:ounting syst~xn will take a bit of a detour,
:roving to an IBM System/38 minicom?
purer for two or thra years before it ends
up on the PC network.
The ids of scraQping the mainframe
~vasn't made overmght, or capriciously.
There were a number of factor beyond the
=xpiration of the lease that led Tanner
southwest to the decision. Primary among
:hose was dissatisfaction with the main-
~rame's performance.
3278
done by the mainframe. In addition, doing
so would save the company some 580,000
per month in software license fees for CICS
and the mainframe system software, and
enable it to reduce the data-processing staff
from 40 employers to 20 over afive-year
period. Thus, the decision was made-the
mainframe became a lame duck.
Anyway you look at it, it's an audacious
plan. Distributed proceuing is one thing,
and treating the tnatnframe as a giant file
server is another, but eliminating both the
mainframe and minicomputers with a net-
work of PCs?
Sounds outlandish, but if you listrn to
Mr. Tanner and the people he works with,
it becomes obvious they've thought this
through carefully and stem to have solid
answers to every possible objection.
For instance, conventional wisdom
would have it that the mainframe would
bat a PC-based network hands-down in
three critical areas: security, reliability and
performance. Mr. Tanner disagrees.
"We've got an on-staff EDP auditor who
found that the security on the network was
much better Wan what we had on the main-
PC with
INS network
gateway
r- - -i
_,...,. ~ - - - 3278 r
I .:tea=:.,_,. i
`aiia~:-:
I
I Other locations
PCWJ
IRMA
For instance, the software the company
used for its accounting was outdated and
needed to be replaced. After an extensive
search, the company found s modular ac-
countingsystem that seemed to fit the bill,
and installed the general-ledger module.
According to Ron Tanner, the experi-
rnce was "a disaster." The company found
it had to double the mainframe's capacity
just to run the general ledger, and even
after doing so, the package ate so much of
the mainframe's resources that the comp~-
nycouldn't install the other modules of the
accounting system.
Mr. Tanner also recalls that other tact
problems had crated a situation where
"companywide, the srntimrnt was against
the mainframe."
Meanwhile, the company's early experi-
ence with PC networks were good and
suggested that the networks could expand
to handle every task that was then being
frame," Mr. Tanner said.
"Novell hu really good security facch?
des, plus we use a utility that we developed
and sell, called Hot Print, that adds anoth?
er layer of security [Hot Print automatical-
ly password-locks a system that has been
inactive for a sptcialized period of time.
and allows the user to lock the system with
a single keystrokej. And, we lock people
into our mrnu system so that they can't ge:
to DOS," he said.
Extra Layers
David Keeney, Tanner's microsystems
technical analyst, added, "I'm the one whc
wrote the mrnu system, and I can't break
out of it. And evrn if somebody did figure
out how to get to DOS, they've got to des!
with NoveU's security. Novell has security
by user, by group, by directory and by file."
As for reliability, Mr. Kerney noted that
"Before ere moved to our new building, we
had our server up for 6'/, months, 24 hours
a day, seven days a week, without a hiccup
Then we had a power failure. The servec
was back up immediately whrn the powec
came back on, while the mainframe was ow
all morning because iu IPO (initial power
on] is so long."
To augment We reliability of the net
work-based systems, We company main~
taus aninventory of spare parts-extra
network adapters, network hub control~
lets, disk controller and an extra hart
disk-that can beput on-line within a shot
time should any of the network's compo
Heats fail. The company also plans to adop~.
Novell's system fault-tolerant NetWare-
which user a redundant hard disk-whet
Wert system is available.
Mr. Keeney said the network is already
more reliable than the mainframe in mangy
ways, if only because PC-based softa?ar<
systems can survive the failure of a key
component better than mainframe-basec
systems.
He cited, u an example, the truckdis
patching system used by Tanner's Unitec
Metro Material Division to schedule arc
account for We location of 200 to 300 con-
crete-mixer truclts. The trucks cost show
5100,000, and We drivers receive unior
wages. The intertudly developed disperser
system uses radio boxy in each truck tc
track them on aminute-by-minute basis.
In the tight yeah the mtemally Bevel
oped dispatch system has ban in use, it ha<
(Continued on !'age C/J01
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
COST COMPARISON
Proposed Mainframe Solution
Cost Summary
'Li Hardware ''
~'"'~IBM~4361 Model 3
Software
DOS/VSE Operating
Systems
Software Application
' Other
Facilities
"Technical Support ':
Proposed PC-LAN Solution
Cost Summary
~xHardware
5 IBM~PC~"AT
? w~. w rkx,~~. . ea
~2.Novell Disk~Drnres'
.Print r
Magnefio~,; ape: ni
~Network~,l ardwate
Other ."
10 Facilities '
50
Conoco Inc.'s accounting demands and multinational field sites seemed to dictate a mainframe solution, but
even the most skeptical engineers were won over by an inexpensive, fully functional LAN?based system.
In(tlsl Annual
Cost Cost
(thousands) (thousands)
Inltlal Annual
Cost Cost
(thousands) (thousands)
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
~?
Network Standard:
Novell Netware Becoming System
Of Choice for IBM Token-Ring
By Paul Bonner
Novell Netware appears to be
on the verge of becoming the de
facto standard network operating
system on IBM's Token-Ring
Network, according to numerous
corporate users.
As corporate installations of
the Token-Ring hardware begin
to grow in siu and number, many
network evaluators report that,
whine they want to use IBM To-
ken~~Ring hardware, they have
found the IBM PC LAN program
inadlequate foe corporate use and
have: turned to Novell Netware as
an alternative.
`.'ll wish someone had told me in
adv~ince what I know now. The
IBbi LAN program is a waste of
time," said Patrick Power, senior
network analyst at New York
University Medical Center. Mr.
Power is in the process of switch-
ing from the IBM software to
Novell Netware on a LAN he be-
lieves will grow to S00 PCs in the
first quarter of this year.
"We tested the two operating
systems side by side on the same
hardware. The IBM software
wasn't even close to Novell," said
Mr. Power. He claimed that Net-
ware was superior to the PC LAN
program both in terms of perfor-
mance and in ease of setup aad
administration. Other network co-
ordinators had similar comments.
Warren Knox, computer tech-
Continued on Page C/7
LAN Focus:
Review: Att
Explanation
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
Nalvell Netware
Is New.Standard
For Token-Ring
nical specialist for the city of Corpm Chris-
ti, Taus, runs the PC LAN program ten the
nerwerlt he controls, but u conaiderin` a
switch to Netwarc. "It sears to be a slicks
package both in performarce and in the
user intetfaa," be said.
Thr. Corpus Christi network will eventu-
ally ~' to SO to 71 workstations. One
reaarnn Mr. Knox is considering a switch to
Netwarc is that, "I don't think the IBM
software would perform adequately oa a
50.nade network. We only have five nada
right now, and I've seat some real prob-
lems with performance already."
Battka's Trust of New York also re-
centl!rdecided to gowith acombination of
IBM Token-Ring hardware and Novell
Netwue software. Pam Oehlberg, manag-
er of offs tahnology, said bar depart-
ment's benchmark teats showed- that
Netwue was much fasts than the IBM
PC LAN program u the numbs of the
user on the network grew.
Crrug Burton, Novell via preident of
corporate marketing and devebpmeet. ati-
matal "about 30 percatt of the Token-Ring
sales have Netwarc involval with than"
He rtded, "People who are installing the
Tokm?Ring src usually looking for perfor-
mance, reliability sad a network they an be
seriouu with. They look u the IBM software
and at Novell and say it's not diftlcult to
decide which one to do that with."
I?erfi~trreanae Wire Ont
Mr. Burg may be oversimplifying the
sue with which mast firm tea turn away
from IBM for somethu{ like a network
operating system. Several of the ndwork
coordiituron interviewed wbo had dettided
to switch to Novell software tiro worked
at lerigt6 with IHM repreaentuiva in an
efTort to improve the performance of the
PC LAN program.
Mr. Power notes! thu he "sport several
days at 590 Madison Ave. [IBM's head-
quartenJ, spatding time with their paipk
and experimenting with the networks
they've got ser up there. The end result was
chat you just wuldn't approuh the level of
performance of the Novell softwue."
Mr. Knox said hies IBM represrnutiva
cold h,im that the performance problems his
group rncountered in Corpus Christi city
governmrnt LANs' just may be a matter of
not having the network tuna! Properly,"
but added that neither the PC LAN Pro
3ram manual nor the represenutiva have
zaplained cleuly "how to balance the pa-
rameuers to get optimum performance."
In tome cases,lBM's represrnutiva ap?
pear to have done Big Blue more hum than
good while trying to sell customers on the
merits of the PC LAN program. "After
having a demonstration of Netwue, I wrnt
co thr- local IBM branch ofTice, and they
cold rare, 'You can't do ihu with a nawork,'
after I'd already seen thane things dose
with Novell," recalled Alan Kass, micro-
:omputer coordinator for Sieraa Pacific
Power Co. in Reno, Nev. "IHM says the
network is just basically good for sending
riles stole and forth. It sounded to me like
they really didn't know what they were
calkic~g about."
Often, [he decision not to go with 1HM
network softwue hu to be made in the fan
of objections from senior mamgaaent,
who prefer an all-IBM solution in a move
u strategic u choosing s local area net-
work. Ms. Oehlberg of Banker's Trust aot-
a!that she wu reluctant to pick Novell for
that reason, but added, "the performance
disparity betwam IBM's software and Net-
ware west too much to ignore."
Moat of the network coordinator inter-
viewaf felt it was important to select IBM
hardware for a LAN is order to remain
compatible with IBM's future conaativity
moves. However, they generally did not
fed that it was u naxsary to select IBM
software for use on the LAN.
' I'm not womal about going with No-
yell. How often don IBM come out with
as overwhelming software product?" Mr.
Power card. "1be wont txse u tf IBM don
come out with a dramatically new operat-
in`` system next year, then we burn the
(IQovellj software; we still have the IBM
hardware." '
Siam Pacific's Mr. Kass also feria coaft-
dent in going with Nove14 "I would hai-
tste to go with an unproven vendors prod-
uct, but Novell has daoamtrated thu thsy
know what they're doing with networks,'
he said.
Summing his experirnca in planning the
NYU Medial Crnters nerwork, Mr. Pow
er said, "We've made an investment n
IBM hardware. We need to do that in orde
to fal safe, but we also need a viable net
work operating system that wean offer c.
the user."
Fulfilling that need today appear to b
the bottom line for thane choosing to roc
Netwue oa IBM's Token-Ring hard
ware. fa
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
INCREASING MIGRATfON:
Companies Use PC LANs for
Tasks Formerly Done by Minis
Lower Costs, Improved Performance and Flexibility
.Persuade Managers To Switch to Local Networks
By Paul Bonner
PC?based local area networks
(LANs) are taking over in corpo-
rate computing situations that
traditionally have been handled
by minicomputers.
According to corporate plan-
ners who have made the switch,
LANs are finding favor both as
replacements for existing mini-
computer systems and as ma-
chines of choice for solving new
minicomputer-style problems.
Corporate computer managers
cite several reasons for going the
PC LAN route. One is cost sav-
ings-a PC LAN may work out
to cost as little as one-fifth as
much as a comparable minicom-
puler system.
Perfot~trtance Boost
But equally important, they
say, are dramatic performance in-
creases that can be achieved with
a well-planned local area net-
work. Managers also cite a tre-
mendous increase in terms of sys-
tem flexibility and the ability to
add new applications almost at
will with aLAN-based solution.
One site where a PC LAN is
taking over for a minicomputer is
Greenfield Partners, a stock bro-
kerage firm based in New York.
Douglas Oh(man, chief operating
officer of the fum, reported that
until ?cently Greenfield Partners
relied upon a variety of systems
for its DP needs.
In addition to usual accounting
procedures, a stock brokerage
must calculate a variety of finan-
cial results on a daily basis in or-
der to meet Securities and Ex-
change Commission (SEC) regu-
lations, Mr. Ohlman said.
"We ended up using several
computer systems to do different
aspects of the job. We used an
outside service bureau for back-
office accounting, PCs for subdi-
visions of the back-office opera-
tion in our own accounting de-
partment, PCs in the secretarial
area for word processing and
computers in the trading area to
crunch numbers there."
The problem with this ap-
proach, according to Mr. Ohl-
man, was that "None of the data
was available from one area to an-
other, and none of the computers
were sharing any peripherals in
common."
The obvious solution was to
link all of Greenfield Partners'
computer users through a mini-
computer system, and so the firm
looked at minis from IBM and
Hewlett?Packard.
But when Mr. Ohlman saw that
it would cost 5150,000 to support
the back-office accounting opera-
tion alone, and that the system
would have required additional
expensive software to support
other areas of the firm, he decided
to look beyond the obvious.
What he came up with was a
PC-based LAN, built around the
Lifenet network from Lifeboat
Design Team, oC Troy, Mich.
The firm is implementing the
LAN in sections, starting with the
ATTACHMENT G
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
PC Laical Networks
Are Taking Over
Nlinicl~mputer Tasks
less cnncal functions and then
adding more important ones.
"We did the word-processing
azea. Then when that scented to
work well? we added in [he gener-
al ledges and posting area from
accounting. Now we're putting
pan of our back-office operation
on the i-AiN. The final step wall
be replacing the outside service
bureau-that would save us
5160.000 a year," Mr. Ohlman
said.
He nou,d that. to date. the PC
LAN hay cost the firm about
530,000. compared with the
S 130,000 chat a mmtcomputa so-
!urines would have cow. Of course.
he conceded. '"There are two sides
to the irate. The packager avail-
able on the minicomputers would
be more stsphisticated than gener-
ic PC applications
C~Omiaed Software
"We bought a standard PC ac-
counting package for about
51,000 this worked fine, except
we learned it daam't handle btl?
lions." ~~[r. Ohhnaa recalled.
"That w~u a tubility. But we
solved that by banp' g m a con-
sultant who modified the pro-
gram so is handles billioris for an-
other S 1,(100. We're still ahead by
54.000. since the minicomputer
accouatin` software could have
coat 56.0(10..?
Brad Waddell, DP manager at
[attic Coto., in Tempe, Ariz: re?
ported equally dramatic cat sav-
tnp vu a ssvttch from a top~of-
the-line Prime Computer Inc.
rttinicoaSSwta system to a Novell
Inc. SiVIiT LAN.
Hut in Mr. Wadddl's cane, it
wasn't cent so much as perfor-
mance wad flexibility that dictu-
ed the change.
Iatnc, ti subsidiary of FCS Lab.
oratories, is anallergy-testing lab.
oratory. Attotha FC5 subsidiary,
Bioproducu Inc., also of Taupe.
Anz.. mazkeu Iatnc's services
through iu telemarketing fora to
physicians around the country.
Until rtxtmtly, the firms had sepa-
rate DP departmenis. Iatric used
a Novell !i-NET PC LAN to com-
pile the results of its tests and to
produce graphically illustrated
reports, while Bioproducts used
the Prime minicomputer system
for order entry, accounting and
keeping track of iu telemarketen'
sales.
As time went on, Bioproducu'
managmim[ began to pressure iis
DP deptu~tment to product the
kinds of reports that [atric was
able to produce on iu PC system.
Since Bioproducts had only 40 us-
ers on a rninicomputersystem de-
signed for 120 users, the system
should have had the capacity to
do the additional work. Neverthe-
less, Bioproducts' DP department
was unable to deliver what its
management wanted
At that point, Mr. Waddell
submiaed a proposal showing
that the existing muttcomputa '
could be replaced by a Novell S-
NETjoined to the Iatric network.
Further. he showed that the
curtert[ tasks of the ittinicomputa
and the additional reports Bio-
products' management wanted
could be reduced using a combi-
nation of the Datatlex multittser
DBMS, Lotus I-2-3. Decisionlie-
source's Chardnasta and word-
proceering software.
PC 'Doer It All'
The ease with which the desired
a~theLAN, aecordingP~~M~r
Waddell, is due to the flexibility of
PCs "We can run anything this
tries on PCs If we find one prod-
uct doeaa't specifically do the job.
we an ga aootha one. On the
rl?iticomputa, the tholes of soft-
ware wan so limited that the DP
people would say, 'It can't be
done,' rather than taking the time
to haodeodc an appliwtsoo."
Mr. Waddell developed a test
system oo a st' PC and detaoa-
strtsted tt to Bioprodtcts' than.
agteneat. "It wan a cheap way to
go," he sand "V it didn't work
Out. what wRe w! Ont7 The COat
of a single PC."
Bioprodttcn' tttaagement ac?
cepted Mr. wttdddl's proposal
and u the same time joined the
DP departmenis of the two firms
into one.
The most dramatic payback
from teplacin{ the minicomputer
with the LAN was cat.
The Botta>o~ Lee
The tniaico~puter was costing
the firm f11,000 per month to
lease and would have coat
5330.000 to parehaae. The total
coat of the Novell network and
the PCs to use on it was leas than
5130,000.
Ice addition, tnaiatenance caw
wen lowered, and fewer DP pa-
sonnel were required to opaau
the system.
According to Mr. Waddell,
however, there wen even more
important paybacks from the
trYl[Ch. One waf sysum perfor-
mance. The network, he said,
"has incredible performance for
our applications"
He stated this the PC LAN can
find and update records five to 20
time faster than the tninicompuc-
a, and [hat "We can run other
jobs anytime we want without
worrying about wdghing down
the system."
"Distributed processing u bo-
hind the increase in perfor-
mance," said Mr. Waddell. "The
amount of time that the PC is ac-
tually communicating with the
networlt is very, very small. So
there's no time that the nawork
itself is bang overloaded.
"In contrast, the minicomputer
is just one big microprocessor that
is serving the needs of many ter
urinals that know nothing except
i 'Show this data on the screen and
send the keyboard data back.' So
with the minicomputer you have
to allow for all these programs to
be running conctttrently in one
processor, and the more people
you add the more you divide the
processor berween than."
The power of the network has
allowed Bioproducu to add con-
siderable funcnottality to its sys-
terra. For instance, iu sales tram
actions arc now validated field by
field against the cattral database
as they arc entered where before
an entire scranful of informanoa
had to be entered before any vali-
duioa could occur.
In addition. Baprodttcts' tek-
lnarketen arc now rigid into the
tea-rnulta database, so they can
supply test reports to physicians
over the telephone. where before
they was unable to do so.
In the long run, the flexibility of
PC-based LANs might be an even
stronger selling point than their
coat advantages. As the mattager
of one infornisnon gathaiag sa?
via which recently installed a PC
LAN in lieu of a ttainicomputer
ttoted "One advantage u coat.
But I would not ttecesaarily argue
this u thin point. These taight not
always be as immediate savings ??
The biggest advantage of PC
LAMS. he said was "You have
flexibility in adding aorkstatiom
arxordiag to your workload. If
you have a fluctuating workload
or a nerd to t additional sta-
tiom on at peak times, You can do
Roeottrees AvaflabN PK User
In a 50-Wtxkstatlon F.nvirottmwtt
T RAM 4K
CPU M: 130K
Dick forage: 1 8
T 'nal MIPS: 0
CP MIPS: .1
A Coat S2,
8aasd on cornOttt+n9 a NOVaN S-Nat UN wan tnrsa oMMZ Ee000-baaad aarvara ono a to-
tal of SOOM tiytas ha10 disk ltOrapa and t 2M hy1M of sMVar RAM ro a 5 MIPS su0arrtn-
n~COmputM wM ~M lty1N of RAM and e00M Irylaa Of Oink 3tCrapa. Coat ednpanwna ayes
Daead on tM piircnass ortca of tna wotrea tAN and 50 PCs prontad over sot yawn txxn-
pers0 to fns S1t,fM0 montnly rasa and maattananca cost of tM mcnicomputar on a sac
year IeaM.
so. With trunicomputen you have
to buy a bigger CPU to add tetmi-
tuls. In a LAN you simply add
another PC."
dir. Ohlmaa of Greenfield
Partners underscored that polar.
While saying that "It was much
more coat-effective to implement
a LAN system which could have
multiple-p~rocessing capability
and therefor operate even faster
than a minicomputer at a fraction
of the pna of a mimcomputa,"
he added thu the flexibility af-
forded by the LAN wan a major
selling point for hies firm.
BetLQ SORwaee SdeM~01a
..When you buy a ttsiiticomput-
a you're stuck anth whatever
software tlae manufacturer taakes
available. while with the IBM PC
or machines of its genre, software
is available from many different
vendors and you're tsa restricted
to one manufacturer's software,'.
he said
The performance advantages of
LANs can also be impressive. Mr.
Ohhnaa feels that these advaa-
tages err: due to the tmmputin`
power concentrated in each PPCC
on a LAN.
At Greenfield Partaas, that
pmva is coasidaabk, slaw the
standard PCs tised as wnrksta?
dais on the LAN are equipped
with IOMHs 80286 coptttcoor
bards.
"A minicomputer just can't
compete with a network of PCs
funning at IOMHz because each
PC has iu own proceswr.' Mr.
Ohlman sated. This advantage.
he predicted. "will enable almost
any company to use standard PG
and do dutnbuted processing."
This u not to say that minicom-
puter arc about to be swept m[o
obsolescma by PC-based LAYS.
As Fred Federlein, nerwork prod-
uct manager for Corporate Soft?
ware, of Caatoa Mass.. noted.
"Minicomputer have a valid
plea for bauh-processing large
amounts of information or having
centrally controlled storage-~s-
pecially in things like mantitac-
tttring or distributed tnvrntory
control when you have a singly
ftmction system.,.
But, he added. in a situation
such as that at Bioproducts
"whore there's a lot of proceuing
of a shared central database. the
network might provide better
performance than the minicom-
puta."
[attic's Mr. Waddell has also
considered the relative menu of
minicomputer systems and PG
based LANs. He concluded,
"The minicomputer is best
served with a small work group
that maybe does a lot of calcula-
tions. But u far as moving a lot of
dais around goes, the LAN defi-
nitdy beats it." ^
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
Wang Hurt by Closed Architecture
By Emily Kay
LOWELL, MA-Wang Labo-
ratories' early failure to hook into
the~IBM world has led the comps-
ny to its current woes, according
to-Wang watchers.
After growing rapidly from
1977, Wang hit the wall in 1981
when IBM announced its PC.
That~was the beginning of the.end
of Wang's "fat" years, according
to George Colony, president of
Forrester Research, a mazket?re-
search firm in Cambridge, Mass.
The latest in Wang's seemingly
endless series of problems was its
announcement last week that it
will report an operating loss of
535 million for its second quarter,
ended Dec. 31. The company
blamed weak sales.
The loss is Wang's second con-
secutive quarterly loss..For the
previous quarter, it suffered a 530
million loss. Just a year ago, the
company reported a healthy 521.7
million in earnings on sales of
5679.5 million.
In addition, officials said Wang
will eliminate 1,000 of its 30,900
jobs worldwide and will cut sala-
ries by 6 percent in an effort to
save $SO million in the next six
months.-The job reductions will
be. accomplished through layoffs
and attrition, they said.
Wang reached its current state
by failing to understand the im-
portance of an open architecture
and IBM connectivity, according
to analysts.
"Wang was stubbornly propri-
etary," said Mr. Colony. "Their
PC didn't support the IBM world.
Their communications networks
were Wang proprietary. In a time
when users were banging on ven-
dors to open up, Wang continued
to be closed."
Christine Hughes, an analyst
with the Gartner Group, a maz-
ket?research' firm in Stamford,
Conn., agreed.
"Wang was slow to ?react even
at the workstation level in the PC
azea," said Ms. Hughes. "They
should have realized sooner that
IBM was the standazd, accepted
that and differentiated themselves
Continued on Page 131, Column 4
Wang 'I~oubles Due to Lack
Of IBM Hook, Analysts Say
Continued from Page 129
through software rather than try
to build a slightly incompatible
workstation."
Other oft-cited reasons for
Wang's problems have been its
late product deliveries; the inabil-
ity of its sales force to sell any-
thingother than word processors,
especially systems; and its lack of
success in moving from the word-
processing/office-automation
business to being an integrated
systems supplier.
Wang's rivals-Digital Equip-
ment Corp., IBM, Data General
and Hewlett-Packard-all came
out of the data-processing world
and had an easier time making the
shift, according to Ms. Hughes.
Wang also chose to sit on its
laurels rather than to do what it
had to to keep up with a maturing
industry, analysts said.
"If you're riding the wave of
success, you can't become a dino-
saur," Ms. Hughes said. "You
must constantly keep up with
what your users want in terms of
solutions."
. "In afast-changing business, a
company can't extrapolate past
successes into the future," said
Mike Geran, an analyst with the
Wall Street firm of E.F. Hutton:
"It has to change with the indus-
try, and transitions take longer
and are more expensive than an-
ticipated." ~
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15: CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
LISTING OF INVENTORY SYSTEMS
The following inventory control systems were reviewed between 1 October
1986 and 23 December 1986. They are presented here 'for informational purposes.
Acuity
MCBA
Pioneer
Tolas
FMS
Champs
Advanced Mfg. Sys.
Impcon
IMMS
MAN MAN
BOMS IMCS
PMIS
All these systems are minicomputer based. The Pioneer product was
installed on a VAX and tested for suitability. All products would have
required extensive modification and did not allow for the operations
particular to the study at hand.
ATTACHMENT I
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
SOFTWARE*
NurtiberoffiNdUrecortl
1128 1
400
Record Size (maximum)
14000
I x088 .
Reeorda~Daza FiN
11,000,000.000
I UnNmited
RecordtrlDatabaw
110.000.000.000
I UnNmked
Raid Slzs (maximum)
12`"~
14082
Daze Types
I ~+ar,int,rsal,logel,dats.tirtts.long text
I char,iM,resl,becl,dazs.time.ing txt,monsy
Range Testing
I Y?
I Yw
TabN Oriented Struaun
I no
I Yes
DefauN Vazues
I no
I YK
SpecAlc Value
I no
I no
Extamaz Table Lookup
I no
I YK
Forced Upper Caw
I Y~
I no
Unique FiNdt
I Yw
I Y?
Data Conversions
I Yes
I Yw
Automatb Data Entry
I no
I Y~
Cakulazsd Fields/Entry Scm
I no
I YM
Error Procewing
I Y?
I Y?
Number of Index FINS
17
1400
Compound Indexes
I YK
I no
Max Number of Open Filar
I t0
I ~
Mazh Updates
I Yw
I yef
Text Updates
I Yw
I Yw
TabN Merging
I Yw
Yee .
MuftQN Record Updates 6 DN
I yes
I Yw
Dynamic Menus
I Yw
I Yw
Or~Lne Mep
19~
I Exeellsnt
Hlgh LwN Language IntertaCe
I Pascal and C Optbnel
I Optbnaz
File lacking
I Yw
I Yw
Record Locking
yes
I Yw
"--PC Nomad data not available, Dunn & Bradstreet (the program developers) say PC Nomad is not comparable to
these systems until at least the next release in November
ATTACHMENT J
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
Software Continued
Report, Screen, Query and Program Generator Data
A'~i capabilities listed below an achelwd with np programrtnng,
d8ase IIIti
Painting I Yes
coordinate Speeitlation 1 no
Screen Programming I YM
Number of Senens/File 1 78
Number of FiIWSCrssn 170
Prortpt WMesages for Fisld~ yes
Arithmetic Functions in Fields yes
ilAullple TabIN I yes
Report Subtotals 1 2 levels
Colurttnwfw Reports 1 yee
Rowwise Reports 1 no
MuhiMvel AMnus I no
Integrate Custom Forms 1 no
Integrate Custom Reports 1 no
Custom Hep Screens 1 no
Edit Applications 1 no
IYK
IY? I
IYM I
IYK I
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
? Review ? Data Management
R:base:
The Promise
Expressed
Has dBASE finally met its match?
Microrim's R:base System V
successfully bridges the gap
between ease of use and capable
data management and offers a
menu-driven system that can create
drum-tight turnkey applications
without programming.
I~I~I The synergistic rivalry between dBASE and
R:base continues. But unlike many other free-
market contests, the customer has walked away the
winner. dBASE has become, dare I say it, almost user-
friendly. And R:base, once an amiable file manager
with promise, has evolved into a mature, full-featured
data base manager complete with command
language.
Yet a feeling of unfinished business persists. For
all its improvements-a more astute menu-driven in-
terface, plus a screen anc~ program generator-dBASE
111 Plus is still a forbidding product for workaday
users. When it comes time to forge a complex custor
application, you usually find yourself back at the in-
famous dot prompt, tapping in commands-or on the
phone to a programmer. R:base 5000 eliminated
much of this unpleasantness with its diagrammatic
prompt feature, hand-holding menu system, and ca-
pable Application Express. Yet Microrim failed to
fully extend the Express concept to reporting and
forms generation. The promise remained unfulfilled.
No longer. With the release of R:base System 1
complete programming power is only a menu away.
Microrim's answer to dBASE lil Plus heals the
schism between power and ease of use in the onl~~
way possible: with multiple solutions. System V in-
cludes the programming features that power users
and developers pine for and introduces three menu-
driven front ends-Definition Express, Forms Ex-
press, and Reports Express-that enable tyros and
pros alike get to the heart of System V fast. With the
tried-and-tested Application Express already in place
do-it-yourself business users can wrap all the ele-
ments of an application into one neat package.
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
E~ Confederacy of Solutions
^ ~iystem V is not a single program, but a collec-
tion of like-minded modules. You can define a file's
structure, enter data, or create reports at ground level
by typ~.ing simple English-like commands at the R
prompt and combining them with file names, field
names,, Boolean operators, and so on. Place Prompt
before a command and System V will not only de-
scribe it but list the file names, keywords, and other
parameters that would logically follow. The com-
mands are relatively straightforward, but mastering
the entire K:base lexicon is not something you can do
in an afternoon.
~>ave your synapses. With System V's new
menu-driven Express modules, you can put the pro-
gram through its paces without ever typing a com-
mand. If you follow the Definition Express menus
and prompts, you can set up simple data tables or
construct a huge network of interconnected tables,
including lookup functions, cross-field calculations,
and data validation. Forms Express and Reports Ex-
press give you the same automated power in creating
reports and on-screen data entry/retrieval forms. And
as we shall see, the Application Express can spin the
necessary program code that fuses the parts.
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
Figure 1: R:base System V, dBASE III Plus,
and R:base 5000 single-user performance
compared (times in minutes:seconds)?
R:base System V
^ dBASE III Plus
R:base 5000
Simultaneous find and display
100
records
1000
records
10,000
records
Simultaneous find and replace
100
records
1000
records
lo,ooo
records
Import a 10,000-record ASCII delimited file
No
indexes
Two
indexes
'All tests were conducted on an AT-compatible,
8-Iv1Hz Hewlcso-Packard Vectra. -
Movin' On Up
This kind of power doesn't come cheap-but at
least you get your money's worth. The System V
package tips the scales at nearly 8 pounds and in-
cludes three manuals, seven pamphlets, shard-shell
disk case, and 11 floppy disks totalling 4MB. How-
ever, System V's core program and overlay files oc-
cupy less than 1MB, so once you've created applica-
tions with the Express modules, you can remove the
modules from your hard disk.
Although moving up to System V is relatively
simple, it involves more than clearing out the back
forty on your hard disk. Irritatingly, System V can't
read R:base 5000 data base files directly, but a sup-
plied utility makes the necessary transformation. The
process isn't speedy: For example, on an AT-compati-
ble hard-disk HP Vectra, converting a 10,000-record
file with 13 fields per record and 2 key fields into Sys-
tem Vformat took almost 1'/z hours.
Likewise, System V can't directly run programs
created with R:base 5000's Application Express mod-
ule. But converting an application is simple: Use the
`Modify Existing Database' option from System V's
Application Express menu to select the application
and then save it back to disk. Because the Application
Express generates highly stylized, structured code,
you cannot convert programs written from scratch or
Express applications that have been heavily modified
by hand.
^ R:base and dBASE Basics
As Table 1 shows, System V can handle twice as
many data bases as R:base 5000, concurrently ma-
nipulating 80 files or 800 fields, whichever comes
first. Humble dBASE 111 Plus is limited to 15 open
files, with a maximum of 128 fields. This may sound
paltry by comparison, but don't base a purchase deci-
sion solely on this factor-few applications require
more than 5 or 6 files.
More practical additions are the note field and
the double field. Note fields can store as much as 4K
of text. Since they're variable length, they take only
the disk space an entry requires, making program op-
erations more efficient. Double fields can hold real
numbers of up to 15 digits' precision, useful for mam-
scientific and statistical applications.
System V has the speed advantage, too (see Fig-
ures 1 and 2). [n a simple find-and-display test, Sys-
tem V was 40 percent faster than dBASE 111 Plus, re-
February 1987
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
,~ardless ~~f file size or the number of people using the Figure 2: R:base System V and dBASE III Plus
product ~~n a local area network (LAN). dBASE 111 on the LAN (times in minutes:seconds)*
Phis worked twice as fast on smaller data bases dur-
ing amore complicated find-and-replace test, but ^ R:base System V
turned snail-like when either the file size or the num-
her of network users increased. In the same test,
R:base .1000 generally placed a respectable second.
Simultaneous find and display for 10,000 records each
One ("~I*~~-1 ilk=~~~'1=~~ q?
user
. Commands and Functions: New Faces
Except for a few new network-specific com- Two
mands, 'system V largely adopts the R: base 5000 users
command set. However, there are some notable addi-
tions. T}le View command creates a temporary table Five
users
chat draws fields from a number of sources-a quick
way to visualize how different data bases might be
combined without actually altering their data struc-
tures. Alid by popular request, Microrim has in- Simultaneous find and display for 1000 records each
eluded a Record command that stores keystrokes like One
ProKey does. Naturally, you can play back a macro user
tile, edit it with a text processor, or use it when build- Two
ing custom applications with System V's command users
language.
T}lose with a yen for financial analysis will un- Five
users
doubtedly turn to Crosstab, across-referencing form
of the T.tlly command that lets you zero in on two
unique fields in a table. For example, if you manage a
fleet of trucks and your data base lists each truck and
Simultaneous find and display for 10,000 records each
its model type, carrying capacity, and current loca- One
Lion, yogi could use Crosstab to list the trucks by lo- user
cation and capacity (see Screen 1).
Two
[f you keep the books with dBASE and are con- users
tinually frustrated by the lack of specialized financial
functions, fume no more. System V users can draw Five
un a collection of new "supermath" functions that, users
among other things, help compute payment sched-
ules, various forms of future and present value, and
interest rates. But don't be misled by Microrim's en- Simultaneous find and display for 1000 records each
thllsiastic advertising-these functions don't provide One
immedi;tte gratification, as do their spreadsheet peers. user
l~uu can use them only when assigning values to a
~,lriable or formula. Note, too, that System V permits users
only 10 calculated fields in a file.
The supermath set also includes mathematic, Five
~~~~~~5, ti~~v~avaasc.aaa~, ay~a, a.va~ra,a~av~a, uata. aaau a~~a~a., r,...~,.-. a .,~Ka ~ r, y tS,.~'-,~pj. , ?~fa~. .oa'q~7~w+u'..i
and logic functions. The math contingent deals with o,oo, "``' 2:00? 400 ~.~^ 0 ~,`' ; 8 00.x;
'These tests were performrd using PC's LimarJ AT computers with 6-h11iz
clocks, 1MB of RAh1, 40MB Seagate voice-coil drives, and Gateway Com-
munications G-Net Key Cards ac the works[ations and file server. The No-
vell Advanced Netward86 V2.0 operating system was used at the file server.
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
~ Keview ^ iJata cv-anagemeni
absolute values, exponents, logarithms, and remain-
ders; string functions convert text from lowercase to
uppercase and vice versa, fill in spaces with a given
character, center text, and return a string to its origi-
nal function or program.
Extra Express
When the Application Express debuted in
R: base 5000, the aim of turning data base application
development into a simple menu-driven process was
somewhat hampered by the fact that you still had to
create tables, forms, and reports with R:base com-
mands. System V finally brings these key functions
into the fold with Definition Express, Forms Express,
and Reports Express. Building a table that cross-
references five other data bases, an on-screen form
that validates data, or a report that subtotals stock on
hand by part number involves picking options from
menus offered by the appropriate module. The Ap-
plication Express will likewise lead you along the
straight and narrow, helping you pull together the
parts of an application at the right time. You never
confront the R prompt or experience the Sturm and
Drang of command-language programming.
Some highlights in the expanded Express clan:
Definition Express. The groundwork for a data
base is laid here. Pick `Define a New Database' from
the Definition Express main menu; name the file, rec-
ords, and fields; and then specify field types and
lengths as you go. A number of field types are avail-
able, but computed fields are perhaps the most useful
because they can calculate values (such as subtotals)
based on other fields. This not only saves typing time
but provides some answers before you even generate a
report. Definition Express also lets you secure a file
(such as a payroll data base) with a password, create
temporary tables with the View command, and most
important, impose rules on specific fields.
Rule is just another name for data validation-
an important feature when novices are entering data
in a system. Depending on the parameters you supply,
a field might accept only dates in the dd/mm/yy for-
mat, accept only zip codes that fall between 80000
and 90000, or double-check an entered part number
by referencing another table (see Screen 2).
Fashioning rules is a complicated operation
with most data management programs, but the Defi-
nition Express is positively avuncular during the pro-
cess. Choose `Rules' from the Definition Express
main menu, select `Add a New Rule' from the menu
chat follows, and identify the targeted table from the
list displayed by the module. Next, supply the error
message you want the application to display if the
rule is broken. When you identify the field the rule
applies to, the program displays a "setting sheet" in
which you specify operators (greater than, less than,
equal to, and so on) and the value or field the entry is
being compared to. You can apply as many rules as
you want to a field using AND, OR, AND NOT, and
OR NOT connectors.
Forms Express. Once a data base is defined,
you move on to the Forms Express, which initially
displays a blank screen. To design a form, you type in
permanent text, such as headers, footers, and field la-
bels, and then point to the spots where data will actu-
ally appear when printed out (see Screen 3). To speed
data entry, a form can even fill in its own blanks with
fixed values (such as today's date), values taken from
the previous record (a great timesaver if you are en-
tering several records for the same company), or val-
ues grabbed from a field in some other file. A form
can span five pages; include computed fields; and, for
security's sake, restrict user access to a file on a read-
only, edit=only, or enter-only basis.
A form can also display the results of a lookup.
For example, I stored the expression `vname =
vname in vendors where vnumber =vnumber' in a
computed field and retrieved a vendor's name, ad-
dress, and credit rating simply by entering the vendor
number (vnumber). I devised this construct without
ever consulting the manual, and it worked just fine-a
testament to System V's logical design.
A form isn't glued to a single file, either. With
the Region and Tier features, you can open windows
into five different files and display or collect data for
all of them. For example, a single form could route
selected sales data (customer name, address, com-
pany, and so on) to a customer file and funnel ship-
ping orders to an inventory file (see Screen 4).
Of course, menus can sometimes lead you
down electronic rabbit holes. If you're not careful,
you can inadvertently create circular dependencies
and discover several files frantically locked together,
each expecting vital results from the other. In general,
make sure formulas forward results from file to file in
only one direction.
Reports Express. Part of System V's charm is
the similarity among its modules. Laying out report
February 198%
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
R>CROSSTA/
-ERROR- Syntax is incorrect for the eorrarl
SYNTAX~~-~--:__ -_?_-
CROSSTAe colaaref BY rnlsareZ -...
COUNT
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1'or aJ~itioral HBLr'test,' ester a corrar~ care. To leave HELr, enter BNO.
I'or the rreviors belt rear Tress [6SC1
M}-
an itetiritior Merr
C Nit B:rressior Gste.ise Rrar
Iwoin:.6:. 6 .
Str..t: s
Srite: S
City: S
there: S 6
B
c
6 state: se
ray Methol: S
rust: S 6 Last: S
title: s c. Corrary: s
s B s
s 6 s
s e s
S B S
S B S
nerchar~iss: S
Tas: S
Shirri~y: S
Total: S
ZIP: S B
6 Shirriiy Tyre: S
B S B S B
a s B s e
B S B S
B S B S B
B' S B S
Screen 1: Error-handling is
System V's forte. In this case, the
error screen depicts the proper
syntax for across-tabulation
and, at the bottom, a successful
Crosstab operation. This table
collates trucks by carrying
capacity and storage log.
Screen 2: The rules-creation
worksheet in the Definition
Express. This rule references the
vendor table to ensure that the
vendor number entered in the
product table is legitimate.
Screen 3: The Forms Express
definition screen. Field labels
have been typed in; `S' and `E'
tell System V where a field starts
and ends.
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
~ Review ? llata Management
headings, footers, control breaks, and fields and de-
fining variables and lookup functions are almost the
same as designing a data entry/retrieval form. But it
wasn't always so easy. In R: base 5000, pasting down
the city, state, and zip fields in an address line meant
defining three variables and concatenating them.
Worse still, report width was limited to 131
characters.
System V's Reports Express corrects these
deficiencies and completely supplants the Extended
Report Writer utility created by Microrim for dis-
gruntled R:base 5000 users. Among other improve-
ments, areport can span 255 characters across a
page, and editing a format is easier thanks to an ex-
pand mode that inserts lines in a section as needed.
After mastering the Forms Express, I quickly
jumped into the Reports Express and created single-
record vendor profiles, lists that subtotaled sales by
product, and labeled summary reports that tallied
sales activity by vendor. For simple tasks like this,
leaping before you look is seldom fatal. As we shall
see, putting an entire system together with the Ex-
press modules takes planning.
^ The Sum of R:base's Parts
Once a data base and its forms and reports are
defined, you can run the assemblage from the R
prompt or tightly bind the elements together with a
program written from scratch or generated by the
Application Express. Opt for the command approach
if you're not sure how the data will be used. For ex-
ample, if you're a Civil War historian and your data
base contains bibliographic entries for books, journal
articles, and unpublished diaries, plus sketches of key
officers, battles, and campaigns, setting up System V
like an accounting program doesn't make much
sense. Instead, you will probably need to root around
in files, spontaneously concoct cross-references, and
enter and edit data on the fly.
If free-form data management isn't appropriate,
a System V program might be in order. Writing a
large, bug-free application from scratch with menus,
help screens, automatic data conversions, and so on,
is a major undertaking-but not if-you rely on the Ap-
plication Express.
The Application Express poses questions and.
based on your answers, builds menus to run the ap-
plication. Typically, you name each menu, select the
menu type (either table of contents or 1-2-3 com-
mand-line style), and declare whether the user will
be allowed to back up to the previous menu using
. If a help screen is needed, the Application
Express produces a blank screen for you to fill in.
Finally, you type in the options that will appear in
each menu.
Here's where program design rears its head:
Each option must be assigned an action (see Screen
5). The actions, which parallel System V commands
such as Load, Edit, Modify, and so on, are plucked
from a menu at the bottom of the screen. If an option
forces the program to open a file, display adata-entry
form, or print out a report, Application Express will
list and integrate any files, forms, and report formats
you created earlier.
The last question is the knottiest: Does any
menu option lead to a submenu? If it does, follow the
same steps, assigning actions to submenu items and
creating still more submenus if necessary. This is ho~v
an application grows and, sometimes, takes on a life
of its own. Planning is key-don't immediately sit
down in front of the PC and start rattling away at the
keyboard.
Once an application is complete, the Applica-
tion Express drops the source code into an ASCI[ file,
saves a special version for editing with the Modify an
Existing Application function, and creates a binary
file that System V can execute. The latter is a little
bulky and inefficient by professional programming
standards, but it's just as powerful as any handwrit-
ten application. If you want to protect your code and
perhaps squeeze some extra performance out of it,
you can convert the binary file to an unmodifiable
form with System V's CodeLoek utility.
Multiuser R:base
Although the Year of the LAN has yet to arrive,
both Microrim and Ashton-Tate have taken care to
add network components to their latest data manag-
ers, just in case. Like dBASE 111 Plus, System V is
compatible with the IBM PC Network and runs on
3Com and EtherLink LANs using 3Com3 + or No-
vell Advanced Netware/86 software, and Ungermann-
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
Pirst: Jeffrey Last: Corsas
Title: Mr. Company: Steel Iesi~s, Ise.
:itreet: 2e1 Tss-ri~~s Y
Ssite: Ssite 33
City: ealtisoro State: Me Zip: 21212
Pkose: 3e1 113-1232 Pay Metko~: COe Skippiy Type: UPS/e
12:)123 Ma~setic Tape/16ee !eel 23.95
12:)156 Plr: Solvent/1 GI 115.5!
12~17e9 blt Cstter 52.35
Mer~:kandise: 316. e9
ra.: e. ee
Iskippiss: 12. se
Total: 358.5!
r~er Lstry Mais Mess
(1) ftnter a Sal?
(2) Ckeek er/er States
? (3) faster Ves~or eata-ase
(1) Lster Pro~sct data-ase
(5) Ester Inventory
(fi) Print Eeports
Screen 4: One form, two files.
With the Region and Tier
features, you can enter data for
two different files from one
form.
Assign actions to eew optlos 2
koose an aetios
Lod Llit Mlete Modify Bslset Print Gstoe Macro fesplats
Mens Passsor~ t:it
fESC] Done IF31 Actions [F191 Help
Application PLAY --- data-ass CIklftS --- Mess Main
Bass Net/One using IBM's PC Network Program,
11~Iicrosoft Networks, or the U-B Personal Connec-
tion. H~~wever, similarities between the two data
managers end there (see "A Plus for dBASE III," PCW,
October 1986).
As Figure 1 shows, System V cleans dBASE III
Plecs's clock in most network operations, particularly
when five users are working on the system at once.
However, add a sixth user and System V either
crashes the network or denies the new user access. In-
creasin;; the wait value (the length of a time a user
can staind in line for a file) has no effect. dBASE 111
Plus, ol) the other hand, picks up a sixth workstation
Ifncoml~lainingly, although the network runs notice-
ably slower.
Screen 5: With System V, you
follow the menus and answer
the prompts to build a custom
application. Here, the choices on
an Order Entry menu have been
entered, and a System V
function has been linked to
the second option.
In System V's favor, file locking is performed
smoothly and automatically. (This is a manual opera-
tion in dBASE 111 Plus.) Neither program supports
record locking, but System V alerts you if someone
changes and saves the record you're working on. You
can then either save your changes (and overwrite~the
previous user's edits) or exit the system.
Like most networked data management pro-
grams, System V provides several levels of security. A
network manager can allow a user to read and
change all data at will, record and change data in
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!1 Review .Data Management
Table 1: R:base System V, dBASE III Plus, and R:base 5000 features side by side
System V
dBASE lil Plus R:basc SOOU
Requirements
Memory
Hard disk
512K/640K~
required?
256Ki384K-640K~ 256K
recommcnded recommen,3t~1
Capacity
Maximum number of open files
80
IS
40
Maximum number of fields
800
128
4U0
Maximum record length (characters)
4096
4000
1530
Command-line length (charecters)
5000
254
1600
Number of digits of precision
15
15
6
Calculated fields
10
0
NiA
Variable?length fields
?
?
Maximum number of sort keys
10
10
5
Relational operations
Project, join, append
?
?
?
Union, intersect, subtract
?
?
?
View
?
?
Cross-tabulation
?
Functions
Mathematical
String
Statistical
Financial
Date and time
Logical
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
Data base definition
Visual setup
?
?
?
Incercolumn mach
?
Data entry validation without programming
?
Noce field type
?
?
Search on note
?
N/A
Views without programming
?
?
Form generation
Multiple tables in single form without programming
?
?
Multiple rows in form with scrolling
?
Custom colors
?
?
Custom borders
?
?
Report generation
Subtotal levels
10
2
10
Maximum report width (characters)
255
255
131
Columnwise reports
?
?
?
Rowwise reports
?
?
Custom borders
?
Application gencration
Automatic generation
Multilevel menus without programming
Edit applications without programming
Integrate custom forms and reports
Incorporate custom help screens
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
?
Networking
File locking
?
?
Record locking
?
?
NSA
Cost per workstation
none
S 199
~1lA
File import
ASCII delimited
?
?
?
ASCII text
?
?
?
dBASE II
?
?
?
dBASE Ill
?
?
dBASE III Plus
?
?
R:base X000
?
?
I-2.3
?
?Z
?=
Symphony
?
?3
?'
pfs:file
?
?
?
DIF
?
~
?
SYLK -
?
?
?
Miscellaneous
Copy protected
Macros
?
User-defined function keys
40
9
U
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/08/15 :CIA-RDP90-000778000100060005-9
some files but not in others, or merely browse. Pass-
words; can also be used to bar unauthorized users
from ~~ensitive areas.
But for many, System V's overriding advantage
is simplicity. Once the LAN manager installs System
V on the network's server, you merely run a brief in-
stallation program (which creates a CONFIG.SYS
file) and type set multi on to get in on the action. In
the di4ASE III Plus world, life is not as simple. Every
workstation must have its own access disk. Unfortu-
natel}~, dBASE 171 Plus comes with only one access
disk, so you must lay out a cool $995 for an Ashton-
Tate 1:.AN Pack to get five more disks.
^ Not-So-Light Reading
When you consider System V's scope and mul-
tiplicity of modes, it's not surprising that the docu-
mentation sometimes fails to impart the lay of the
land. Given the complexity involved, Microrim de-
serves around of applause for providing a complete
and logically organized set of manuals. The user man-
ual, learning guide, and building applications/com-
manci dictionary are your primary sources; Microrim
thro~NS in pamphlets covering single and multiuser in-
stall~ition, R: base 5000 file conversions, and error
messages, as well as a handy template for designing
coml~lex forms. However, the de rigueur disk tutorial
is absent, as are thorough programming samples. Al-
though System V's Prompt feature, help screens, and
menus greatly aid the new user, I hope the next vin-
tage of R:base includes a disk tutorial.
dBASE on the Run?
Although garlands such as "user-friendly" are
tossed about when System V is discussed, user-friend-
line~~s is a relative thing. Although the Express mod-
ules shelter you from System V's commands and syn-
tax, they can't help you devise the underlying plan
that dictates how data is organized and intercon-
nected. That's up to you, so study System V carefully.
Unless you are thoroughly prepared or very familiar
with data management and programming structures,
your application will probably end up snarled despite
pretty forms and comprehensive reports.
Nonetheless, System V succeeds in satisfying
users of almost all stripes. If you yearn to escape the
limitations of your current file manager, System V's
foolproof menu system may be enticement enough. If
PC World
you're an intermediate user who's tired of dBASE III
Plus's halfhearted menu system and patchwork pro-
gram generator, you're another candidate for conver-
sion. And if you're a professional developer, System
V's superior applications generator could cut pro-
gramming time down to size.
In short, System V might be the only data man-
ager you'll evec need. It offers the raw power of
dBASE 111 Plus (and then some), anose-to-the-grind-
stone applications generator, simple yet accomplished
forms and reports generation, and no-penalty
networking.
Still, the last word has not been heard. If
dBASE III Plus pushed Microrim to produce System
V, I'm eager to see what comes next. ?
William Urschel is president of
Arc Tangent, a software develop-
ment firm in Santa Barbara, Cal-
i fornia, and is a frequent contrib-
utor to PC World on business
software. Network benchmarks
were per formed by The Lambda
Group, a San Francisco consult-
ing firm specializing in the inte-
gration of PCs in business.
R: base System V
Microrim, Inc.
3925159th Ave. NE
Redmond, WA 98073-9722
206/885-2000
List price: $700, upgrade for
registered R: base 5000 owners
$200
Requirements: 512K (640K for
local area network operation);
hard disk drive; DOS 2.00 or
later version for single user
setups, DOS 3.10 or later
version for networking
Not copy protected
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Selected Bibliography
These are few of the myriad of articles and books that have resulted in the recommendations of the
preceding section. Some of the data comes from conferences and the manufacturers themselves.
Data and Computer Communications, William Stallings. 1985, MacMillan.
Modeling and Analvsis of Com,~uter Communications Networks, Jeremiah F. Hayes. 1984, Plenum.
"The Token Ring Solution", PC Tech Journal, Scott Haugdahl. Vol. 5, No. 1, January 1987.
Special LAN Issue, PC Mfg-tzine. Vol. 5, No. 21, December 1986.
Special EGA Issue -- "The EGA Standard". PC Magazine, Vol. 5, No. 14, August 1986.
The AT Compatible Series, PC Tech Journal. starting August 1986.
"High Performance Alternatives to the PC AT", PC Magazine. Bill Machrome. Vol. 4, No. 23, Nov. 1985.
"Alternatives to the IBM PC AT", I?C Magazine, Christina Dyar. Vol. 5, No. 8, April 1986.
"Network of the Future", Proceddings of the IEEE, Thomas E. Browne. Vol. 74, No. 9, September 1986.
"Trends in Computer Communications", IEEE Computer, Harry Rudin. Vol. 19, No. 10, November 1986.
Automatic I.D. News, November 1986.
"Wangs Financial Problems", W k, Emily Kay. Vol. 4, No. 2, January 1987.
"EGA Times 12", Bvte. Chris H. Pappas and William H. Murray. Vol. 12, No. 1, January 1987.
Other sources include: the weekly "Strategy" section from PC Week, IEEE Computer, IEEE Micro, IEEE
Proceedings, IEEE Transactions on Professional Communications (Papers Section), IEEE Spectrum, Corporate
Research and Air Force research.
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UNCLASSIFIED ~ ~
UNCLASSIFIED
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