The Integrated Data Store - A General Purpose Programming System for Random Access Memories.pdf

Shawn.W潇

294

12页

5次

2022-11-01

免费下载

A GENERAL PURPOSE PROGRAMMING SYSTEM FOR

RANDOM ACCESS MEMORIES

C. W. Bachman

General Electric Company

Phoenix, Arizona

and

S. B. Williams

General Electric Company

New York, New York

I. INTRODUCTION

During the past ten years, information proc-

essing technology has made significant advances

in many directions. Faster, less expensive, more

flexible hardware has been continually an-

nounced by the various computer manufactur-

ers.

In the software area, the FORTRAN,

ALGOL, and COBOL languages have been de-

veloped and improved and more efficient com-

pilers are now available. Applications now

include the complete spectrum ranging from

free-standing analytical programs to large com-

plex information processing systems.

Computers have been applied to business in-

formation processing problems with varying

degrees of success. Many accounting operations

and facets of historical record-keeping have

been mechanized with proven time, cost, and

accuracy benefits. Those types of business op-

erations dealing with planning and control (or

command and control if you are part of a mili-

tary establishment) are receiving considerable

attention from the mechanization standpoint.

While many mechanization attempts have been

made in this area, the proven successes are few.

To some extent this can be attributed to the

greater complexity of these classes of problems

and the fact that information must be stored,

retrieved, communicated, and processed concur-

rent with the flow of orders and materials.

The information processing field seems to be

moving exponentially in the direction of "real

time"

and total or highly integrated informa-

tion systems. This movement has been acceler-

ated by the introduction of larger, faster, and

more economical mass random access memory

devices coupled with faster computers and bet-

ter communication equipment. These new facili-

ties offer the information system designer a

new opportunity 1) to organize his information

files with minimum duplication and redundancy,

2) to provide a better man-machine interface

by giving people quick access to information,

3) to store, retrieve, and process information

when the need arises rather than when the

computer schedules dictate, 4) to provide a

single data base for many applications as op-

posed to the arbitrary sequencing of single files

for each particular application.

Any attempt to exploit the opportunities pre-

sented by the new mass memory devices places

a high burden on the information system de-

signers and programmers. This is true because

it is difficult to structure and organize complex

information relationships within the parame-

ters of the mass memory devices. It is also

411

412 PROCEEDINGS—FALL JOINT COMPUTER CONFERENCE, 1964

very difficult to write computer programs to

store, maintain, retrieve, and process the com-

plex data. To date there has been little if any

software available to facilitate these problems.

The General Electric Company through its

Corporate Services has been conducting a con-

tinuing research program on the manufactur-

ing control problem since 1956. The decision

table and TABSOL techniques resulting from

this research work were described to the in-

formation processing world in, I960.

During

the past four years a considerable effort has

gone into studying the information require-

ments for manufacturing control and how the

information might be organized and processed

more effectively by using mass memory devices.

As a result of this work, a new approach has

been developed—the Integrated Data Store.

II.

THE INTEGRATED DATA STORE—

A NEW APPROACH'

The purpose of this paper is to introduce the

Integrated Data Store, a general purpose pro-

gramming system for mass random access stor-

age devices. The particular implementation

that will be described is now being installed at

several General Electric sites using a GE-215 or

GE-225 computer. The Integrated Data Store

language and functions will be available early

in 1965 as extensions to the COBOL compilers

for the new GE-400 and 600 series computers.

The principles involved, however, are com-

pletely general purpose and could be readily

adapted to any general purpose computer to

which a mass memory device can be attached.

The Integrated Data Store has been designed

from a user's point of view by users. Further-

more, it is a product that draws upon the inter-

est and ideas of many General Electric-people

with vast and diverse experience as users of

computers in business. Particular credit is due

Homer Carney of the New York Information

Processing Center (GE Computer Department)

who long served as the senior programmer on

the project and Irv Burch and Bill Helgeson of

the Internal Automation Operation whose

ideas heavily influenced the current organiza-

tion of the system. Jerry Aman, Ed Dodge, Phil

Farmer, John Gallagher, Jane Gilbane, George

Hess,

Dave Johnson, Dave Lattemore, Ron

Pulfer, and Tom Waldron are others who have

had a significant impact upon the specification

or programming of the system. Many others

have been helpful since the beginning of the

Integrated Data Store work in 1961.

III.

INTEGRATED DATA STORE-

ADVANTAGES

The original Integrated Data Store software

package was used in mid 1963 to make compari-

sons against conventional random access pro-

gramming techniques in systems design effort,

programming effort, file utilization, and com-

puter running time. The IDS compared very

favorable on all counts. Since that time, further

refinements have been made to the software

package.

Experience to date using IDS has demon-

strated the following advantages:

Greater insight and understanding of in-

formation relationships.

Reduced time and cost to design, program,

and* test comparable applications.

More efficient computer processing.

Better data storage unit utilization

through redundancy elimination.

IV. INTEGRATED DATA STORE-

ORGANIZATION

The IDS can be described best if it is divided

into three areas of discussion:

a. Data Organization—Technique for Mass

Memory

Data and Procedural Language

c. Input/Output Controller

Data Organization refers to the establish-

ment of inter record relationships within the

IDS.

This association is achieved through the

use of chains which provide cross reference

linkages between records. These chains provide

the integrated force which is implied in the

name, "Integrated Data Store."

Data and Procedural Language refers to the

definition of records and their chain associa-

tions,

and the procedural verbs by which these

records are stored and retrieved.

The Input/Output Controller refers to the

physical manipulation of the mass random ac-

cess device and the buffering and housekeeping

of 12

免费下载

文档被以下合辑收录

精品研究报告/论文推荐（共42篇）

精选高品质研究报告和具有里程碑意义的论文供大家参考、学习，持续更新……

关注

文档被以下合辑收录

评论