- 8 -Chapter 2_
Progress of the project

The technical requirements for the project wereThe following had to be arranged:

somewhatcomplex.

(a)Purchase of the necessary equipment to connect our LSI 11/23 to apacket-switched
network,
andacquisition of the associatedsoftware.

(b)Installation of a cable connection between the University
Unit and the Information Science Department.

(c)Installation, by the City University Computer Unit and the University of London Computer Centre, of appropriate packet-switchingequipment at either end of the connecting link (previously used forremote job entry).

(d)Installation, by ULCC, of a gateway to PSS.

Computer

It was clear before we started that we were likely to come acrossunforeseen technical and administrative problems, and therefore someprovision was made for such events in the programme of the project.
Inthe event, the programmed time was not quite sufficient, but a reallocation of funds enabled a short extension.
Given this extension,
the project can be judged reasonably successful, although we did not doquite as much as we had hoped on Objective A, and the user-friendlinessof the system (which is perhaps required by Objective 3) could certainly
be improved.
The following is an account of the various technicaltrative problems that arose.
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andadminis-Connecting links

The development of the ULCC-TCU link to packet-switching operation
had been planned before and Independently of the present project, andwent ahead not too far behind schedule.
The installation of a cable connection within TCU also went ahead
with only a short delay. This connection required line drivers whichwere constructed by Computer Unit staff. A problem arose with theseline drivers, as discussed below.
_2 ._2.

PSS gatewayThe development of a PSS gateway at ULCC, which had also boon
planned independently, was placed in cold storage just before this project started. ULCC already possessed an experimental gateway, but werereluctant to make it available to us (one problem was the lack ofaccounting facilities). Eventually this problem was resolved in a

9 -somewhat ad-hoc fashion; a follow-up to this project will require a moreformal arrangement with ULCC (see Chapter 8 ) .
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Hardware and software in the Department

The necessary interfacing equipment was installed as planned, andthe software obtained from York University. (This system is known,somewhat confusingly from our point; of view, as a Front End Processor that is, it resides in front of the system from the viewpoint of thenetwork!)
The FEP is a small LSI li/03 system, running York software.
Additional York software resides in the main system - the Department's LSI
11/23. This software was still under development when we obtained it,
and presented some problems in the course of the project. These problems were resolved uith the help of the York staff.
2«4.

Noise 0 n the 1 ine

It was apparent early on in the project that the system was having
problems with occasional bursts of bad data received from the network.
Normally, a packet switched system should be relatively immune to badlines (indeed, that was one of the reasons we chose this kind of configuration). Two approaches to this problem were necessary: we had tofind out why so much noise was occurring} and why the York software wasletting it through. The first turned out; to be a problem with thedesign of the line drivers, and York solved the second.
A*A #York software

As indicated above, some delays to the project were occasioned by
the fact that we had a pre-release version of the York software; but inthe end it worked well. There remain s,pme problems of compatibility
between the York soJ tware and that at ULCC. These problems are minor in
the sense that they do not arise very often; nevertheless, they should
be dealt with. It is understood that ^prk and ULCC are collaborating on
this problem.
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Future developments

In August 1983, a demonstration of the system was held for membersof BLR&DD and the University of London CIS. Informal opinion at thisdemonstration was that while the user-friendliness of the system could
be improved, it would form a suitable basis for the kind of evaluation
project originally envisaged for the Jamieson system.
Some considerations relating to this idea are discussed in section 8.