London On-line Local Authorities
London On-line Local Authorities
In August 1971 LOLA’s own computer was installed in the Enfield premises. It consisted of 360/50 computer running MFT (?) with 512K bytes of main store and two 9-drive disk units (each of 236 million bytes nominal capacity).
By December 1972 there were 36 remote video terminals each with 2,000 character screen supported by teletypewriters.
From 1970 IBM technical support was provided by Peter Abrahams. As IMS was so new we were learning the product alongside IBM UK. Having LOLA be a success was critical to both LOLA and IBM, so Peter provided a link through to the IMS developers in San Jose, California.
The IMS developers were rather shocked at how complex the LOLA database design and there were early concerns about performance and reliability.
IBM salesmen in the early 80s was Peter Evans then Neil xxxx. IBM systems engineers were Peter Maunder, Peter Abrahams and Ian Jenner.
It soon became apparent that the predictions for the number of transactions was widely under-estimated. For a start, it transpired that users, being unfamiliar with on-line real-time working, were making additional enquiries on the database to reassure themselves that a prior update transaction had indeed updated the database.
In order to keep transactions efficient, the databases needed to periodically re-organised. This involved writing out all the data to magnetic tape, deleting the databses and recreating them, writing back the data and rebuilding the cross reference links. This could take a weekend.
This, together with the fact that the hardware specification had presumed a far more simpler database design, gave rise for the need to upgrade. The 360/50 computer was replaced in August 1973 with a 370/158 system with 1 megabyte of memory.
For a Repro version of the above diagram with notes on all the components click here .
The legacy LEO III computer that had been operational since 1966 continue to be operated in its original computer centre at 6-24 Southgate Road, London N.1.
It was decommission by April 1974 and the premises vacated in the late summer.
This decommissioning was facilitated by IBM writing a LEO emulation software
In August 1979 an IBM 370/158 AP (Attached Processor) installed. It has 6 mb of memory - an increase of 4 mb!
January 1981 a Magnuson M80/4 (4mb) installed (as well as the 370/158). The Magnuson was a plug-compatible computer compatible with the IBM and cheaper as well.
Unfortunately, in 1982 Magnuson went bust, so an IBM 4341 with 8 mb of memory was installed (the 370/158 remained). IBM's competitive price for the 4341 range had led to Magnuson's downfall.
In July 1983, as further applications developed and the operational load increased, there was a further upgrade to a 3081-D series machine with 24 mb of memory and running MVS. There were 3411 tape drives and 3330 removable disks [200 MB], later upgraded to 3350s [317.5MB per drive (635MB per unit)]. These units had some fixed heads and it was important to locate some crucial IMS/DB files on those tracks.
Other peripherals included 3211 line printers with a mechanical mylar tape mechanism for advancing the paper to a particular channel, that had to be changed for different form types (e.g. payslips, cheques). The console was still a teletype printer.
In November 1985, the 3081 was upgraded to a model K with 32 mb (400 time the size of the LEO).
Whilst the processors and operating system changed over the years, the processors were all compatible with the original 360 architectures; thus no applications needed modifying. This would also apply to the peripherals, particularly disk storage that increased dramatically over the years.
In 1970 the only methods to communicate to remote locations was either by dial-up telephone lines or by leasing a dedicated line from the General Post Office (GPO) the State telecomms operator.
The Haringey 1969 Report on the Initial Study highlighted the availability of Datel 2400 Leased telephone lines running at 2,400 Bauds or 240 characters a second being the fast available and suitable for Video terminals. An 80 column x 25 row screen uses 2,000 characters so it would take 8 seconds to display.
In Ken Lewis' IMS at LOLA presentation to the NCC Conference in 1973, he said LOLA had installed 2 Memorex 1270 Terminal Control Units (TCUs), 10 leased lines and 40 SE Labs 2000 VDU's. These leased lines would run from Enfield Town in North London to the 4 boroughs of Haringey (6km), Hackney (11km), Hillingdon (28km) and Tower Hamlets (10km).
The initial VDUs were not from IBM but from SE Labs as they were more cost effective. Unfortunately by 1975 the company had become bankrupt. Worse, the display control attributes (e.g. bold, italic, user entry field) were embedded within the application’s code. The Application Support Group were commissioned to develop an interface layer so that in the future the application code would be agnostic to the make of VDU.
In February 1975 a further 63 model PTS-100 programmable terminals (VDUs) were purchased from UK company Raytheon Cossor Data Systems. In 1978 Cossor acquired Data Logic and some VDUs were bought later by LOLA as Data Logic PTS-2000 with enhanced APL keyboards.
London boroughs 'on-line', Derek Schartau, Head of Computer Services, LOLA (London On-line Local Authorities), Municipal and Public Services Journal, 29 December 1972 View here
London boroughs 'on-line', Derek Schartau, Head of Computer Services, LOLA (London On-line Local Authorities), Municipal and Public Services Journal, 29 December 1972 View here
London boroughs 'on-line', Derek Schartau, Head of Computer Services, LOLA (London On-line Local Authorities), Municipal and Public Services Journal, 29 December 1972 View here
Timeline of 15 years of LOLA, LOLA Newsletter No. 90, April 86 View Repro here
As recalled in February 2021 by Chris Dee, LOLA programmer from 1974 to 1980.
As recalled in February 2021 by Alan Cooper, LOLA Applications Support from 1970 to 1975.
LOLA Personal Computing Service (overview), PCSG, LOLA, c1983 View Repro here
In 1969 the GPO was abolished and its assets transferred to the Post Office, thus changing it from a Department of State to a statutory corporation. Responsibility for telecommunications was given to Post Office Telecommunications (POT) division. In 1980 POT was rebrand as British Telecom and then became privatised in 1984 as British Telecom plc. View Wikipedia here