‘LING day’ marks world release

Press, 12 November 1985, Page 27

‘LING day’ marks world release

LINC 11, the latest version of the locally developed LINC software product, has finally been released worldwide.

The official release of LINC II was made at the Burroughs users’ group meeting in Atlanta late last month. Burroughs branch offices around the world will have a “LINC day” on November 20 to introduce the new version to their customers.

In New Zealand, however, the product has been openly discussed for more than a year and the release of the product has been a low key event. A number of New Zealand customers, including Pyne Gould Guinness, Ltd, in Christchurch, have been development test sites for LINC II for much of 1985.

LINC II is a major new release of LINC which is significantly different to the previous version, LINC 10. It was intended that the new release would be called LINC 11, but the 11 became Roman numerals and the release is now known as “LINC two.”

Not only does LINC II have major external differences to LINC 10, but it is also significantly different internally. A major proportion of LINC is now itself written in LINC.

In particular LINC II will appeal to programmers, because it interacts more with the programmer as a LINC application is being written. Previously a LINC programmer would use the Burroughs screen editor system to enter in the specifications for the LINC application, including the database specification, the screen specifications and

the program instructions. After a major part of the application had been written the programmer would issue the instructions to have the specifications compiled. Some time later the LINC application would emerge, unless programming errors stopped the system from being built. Under LINC II the programmer will now have a screen-by-screen interaction with the LINC development system. When the programmer has typed in a screenful of LINC specifications it is immediately checked by the system for errors and, if error-free, it is used to generate the COBOL source code for that part of the application. A screen painter in LINC II allows the programmer to interactively design application screens at a terminal, rather than specify the screen format through LINC specifications and row and column numbers.

Responding to market pressures, the Christchurch developers have included a data dictionary facility in LINC II so that the programmer can keep information about the application database in a central dictionary and access it interactively from a terminal. The LINC application specification is itself kept in a LINC database so that the programmer can use a query facility to get information about the application system. LINC’s developers have also provided features that should reduce the criticisms resulting from the monolithic nature of a LINC 10 application. Under LINC 10 it was

usual for an organisation to put all its applications into one giant LINC specification. This specification resulted in a huge COBOL program which would often take a number of hours to generate and compile when changes were made to the applications. Now, with LINC n, changes to the applications do not require the complete COBOL source to be regenerated, but only part of the source. Additionally, the COBOL compilation can take place immediately, while the old version of the system is still being used in production. Different applications can now be split into different specifications, because the developers have improved the ability of one LINC system to pass data to another LINC system running on the same machine. This will reduce the time taken to re-generate a system and the time to copy the old data into the new database created by the modified specification. Only the application being modified need be re-generated if it is kept in a distinct LINC specification. These major improvements to LINC have kept the developers at the Burroughs LINC Development Centre, Ltd, plant in Sheffield Crescent busy for three years with much burning of the midnight oil.

Originally LINC II was scheduled to be released late in 1984, but with only a few weeks to go this plan was abandoned. It took another year before LINC II was eventually released. Mr Alistair Peat, senior marketing manager ’ for Burroughs in New Zealand,

said that the delay was caused because Burroughs in the United States demanded some features at the last minute that the Christchurch developers had not included in the new version.

The next version of LINC, now being worked on, will concentrate on improved performance, rather than major new features. There have been requests from around the world for enhancements to LINC so that it can be used in applications which involve very high transaction loads.

The new features in LINC II are reflected in a slight

increase m the cost of the product For a medium scale user with a Burroughs A 3 mainframe LINC II costs about $l5OO a month to rent This is more than the current price of LINC 10, but considerably less than the price of LINC in its early years when it cost about $100,090.

In spite of the improvements in the new version, Burroughs does not expect all the 1500 LINC sites around the world to convert to LINC n. “Some customers will still prefer to use ‘batch LINC’ rather than the new ‘interactive LINC’,” said Mr Peat.