ADMINS(ID:4469/adm002)MIT Querying systemfor Automated Data Methods for Information Naming Systems Query language for Commercial, uses Forms, Virtual records Developed by Center for International Studies, MIT, 1967/8 Subsequently commercialised by ADMINS Inc Ran on Dec PDP-9, then PDP-11 Related languages
References: INTRODUCTION In the middle sixties there was a revolution in behavioral science computing brought about by the introduction of software systems, or 'packages', on second and third generation batch equipment (Most notably, BMD, SPSS, OSIRIS, DATA-TEXT). These systems offered the analyst a higher-level language designed specifically for the problems of behavioral science data handling and analysis, thus freeing him from the details of programming, data reformatting and using subroutine libraries. A short time later a number of data-management and analysis systems appeared on time-shared computers. (Most notably, ADMINS, DATANAL, TRACE, IMPRESS, TROLL) These systems seemed to hold further promise for the behavioral scientist wanting to analyze data. An analyst would now be able to interact with his data: to test hypotheses, explore for and formulate new hypotheses, test again and so on. In addition, because of immediate feedback on errors these interactive systems were expected to reduce the learning investment needed to be able to communicate with the computer. Unfortunately, to the broader behavioral science community, the promise of interactive systems is still just that a promise. A number of factors contributed to this situation, among which were: i) time-shared computers were not widely available; 2) the cost of using these interactive systems was high compared with the batch systems; 3) the interactive systems did not, in general, have the breadth of capabilities in both data handling and statistics as the batch systems; and, 4) analysis techniques that took advantage of the power of interactive computing were just beginning to be developed. Going into the middle seventies, we feel the situation is ripe for change. The Cambridge Project is a joint effort by computer scientists, behavioral scientists, and statisticians from M.I.T. and Harvard to bring about the change. Janus is an attempt to provide a powerful interactive data handling and analysis tool for the behavioral scientist. Its design grew out of experience with two interactive systems, ADMINS Mark III and DATANAL, and one batch system, DATA-TEXT. In addition, Janus was influenced by systems and ideas from outside of the behavioral science tradition; for example, the relational data work of S. D. McIntosh and D. M. Griffel and that of E. F. Codd. Janus is one of the subsystems being developed for the Cambridge Project Consistent System (CS). The CS also contains other data analysis programs and subsystems, modeling programs, an urban-planning subsystem, an econometrics analysis subsystem and others. in [ACM] Proceedings of the 1972 Annual Conference of the ACM view details |