Project 35: Information systems

Madison 1982:
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Ford discussed information systems, saying that we now have much
quality software but unfortunately many in the user community are
blithely unaware of its existence. He feels that education and
information dissemination activities are now a major priority. Three
major elements are needed: 

	(i) 	awareness of relevant software, 
	(ii)	advice on problem identification and software selection
	(iii)	operational specification . 

The traditional manual has the advantages of completeness and being
easy to read but is inclined to be too bulky and is difficult to
update.  Putting the manual on microfiche keeps its completeness while
making it easy to update (by complete replacement) but it requires a
bulky reader and it is impossible to annotate the margins. An on-line
information system can overcome these defects. An information file can
provide the data necessary for routine selection (e.g. by the tree
search of NITPACK), the operational specification of the chosen
routine and an example (which should include program, data and
results). It can also provide data needed for the traditional manual
via computer typesetting techniques (e.g.  NAG uses Harwell's TSSD),
and for microfiche.

Gentleman remarked that a different style is needed for writing
information that is to be read only a screen-full at once. Ford
replied that it was very uneconomical to have two sets of
documentation and that a punchy style was good for the written
documentation too.