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ACCESS¶

ND 210185 for ND-100
ND 210529 for ND-500

[Photo: Person using a computer terminal next to ND-500]

ND
Norsk Data

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ACCESS¶

Introduction¶

ACCESS is a part of the DIALOGUE family, a set of productivity tools for administrative data processing. ACCESS and other DIALOGUE products are available both on ND-100 and ND-500 series computers.

ACCESS (NOTIS QL) is also a strategic element in the NOTIS family of office support systems.

ACCESS is a personal computing tool for professionals requiring easy access to decision-support information. Such information may be retrieved from small individual databases or from large company databases. Information stored on such databases may be, for example, financial, commercial or technical.

ACCESS is an office support tool and a central part of the NOTIS office information system. ACCESS provides at least two of the services that are required within an office support system. It allows the user to access the company's different databases in a simple, clear, and uniform manner. Routine tasks such as addressing and typing individual 'standard letters', printing out address labels, and maintaining address lists and other registers, may be performed.

ACCESS is also a fourth generation development tool for use by data processing professionals for the rapid development of database-oriented systems.

The Company database may be accessed by managers and professionals. ACCESS provides a simple and fast method for accessing up-to-date financial and business information. ACCESS may select specific information and generate tables, reports, and histograms. All tables and figures produced by ACCESS may be included in any NOTIS-WP document and edited as desired.

ACCESS enables those who are not data processing specialists to use and/or to construct the information systems they require. ACCESS users may start out either by implementing a simple self-made system, or by using the commands to access data on a larger database created by data professionals. Either way, users with initiative will be able to advance and further develop their systems by themselves. Creating new reports, selecting different data for an existing report, and manipulating the data in different ways, are all easy tasks for ACCESS users who wish to improve their own decision support capabilities or automate some routine part of their office work. New ACCESS transactions may be run as soon as they are created, thus providing immediate feedback to the user and aiding in the learning process.

Users¶

ACCESS is suitable for use at different levels by many different types of users. Inexperienced users can run predefined queries. Personal computing users will modify predefined queries or construct new ones. Experienced users may also construct their own tables and databases. EDP professionals will use ACCESS as a tool in system building.

Secretaries
Clerks
Engineers
Scientists
Administrators
Managers
Professionals
Economists
Programmers
Analysts

Areas of Use¶

General list maintenance:
- New entries
- Updating
- Deleting
Reporting from lists
Standard letter addressing
Data refinement
Analysis
Rapid system construction
Ad hoc database querying
Data registration
Address list maintenance
Address label printing

Features¶

Querying of data
Updating of data
Combination of different files in the same query
Different file types within the same query
Available in all European languages
User-created menus
Online table definition
Input forms
Output forms
Histograms
Generation of standard letters to individual recipients
Results may be queried
Arithmetic operations between fields
Logical operations between fields
Several functions may be run simultaneously on the same attribute
Relational data view
Queries may be called from other queries
May run against existing databases
Data types and arithmetic for:
- Text, BCD, Integer
- Double Integer, Real and Numeric Text
SIBAS, ISAM, and sequential files
SIBAS SETS and GROUPITEMS

Functions¶

Print
Update
Delete
Ascending and descending sort with up to 5 keys
Group items
Count items
Sum items
Selection by comparison with other items
Selection by comparison constants
Find unique items - Remove duplicates
Mean, Average, Standard deviation
Find Maximum and Minimum values

Product Description¶

ACCESS will extract information from existing registers and databases.

ACCESS may itself be used to create and manipulate simple tables or databases containing, for example, client information.

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ACCESS¶

ACCESS provides the user with a relational view of the information on its databases. That is, the information has no inherent order and is extracted and processed according to criteria expressed by the user.

ACCESS will sort selected information according to up to 5 different attributes.

ACCESS presents and manipulates information via tables drawn on the screen. ACCESS receives commands by allowing the user to type them into a similar table.

ACCESS allows input forms to be created for simple entry and modification of data. Output forms and bar charts may be used to present information which has been selected.

The ACCESS “HELP” facility will at any time display available commands together with prompts on how to proceed. It will also display details of the items being operated on, the table or database itself, and so on.

Once an ACCESS transaction is defined (a transaction is a selection and/or manipulation of information), it may be stored for later use. When a stored query is used, it may be run directly or modified before use. Stored queries include any input and output forms which have been defined.

ACCESS may operate on the three data structures used by ND’s Office Support and Administrative EDP tools: sequential (SINTRAN) files, indexed sequential (ISAM) files, and the SIBAS database.

Data from up to 10 files/tables may be selected and merged with a construct called 'example element'.

Data which is stored on remote systems, may be accessed transparently over a COSMOS network.

Access in Office Work¶

Example¶

The personnel department wishes to inform employees who haven’t been to a medical checkup within the past 12 months that they should contact the personnel division and make an appointment.

A letter is first typed in NOTIS-WP.

Dear *name:

We do hope that you are in good health, but would like to take this opportunity to remind you that you have not had a full medical examination (by the Company's Doctor) since *date.

Please call us on 3467 any day between 9.00 am and 15.00 pm and we will arrange a checkup at your convenience.

Yours Sincerely,

Darwin P. Erlandsen

*name: is a reference to the employee's name, and
*date: will be used to print the date of the last visit.

ACCESS is used to select employees whose last date of checkup was prior to January 1, 1982, and to extract the required data from their records:

Employees	Name	Division		Last medical
	print.	print.		print. <820101>

NOTIS-TF can then generate individual letters to each employee by merging the letter text with the names and medical dates.

Example¶

The sales manager wants to find out which of her departments were under budget in August, and to list the budgeted and actual sales of those divisions.

S-figures	Department	Budget	Actual	Month
	print.	print. >_ACT	print. _ACT	'August'

In this example, _ACT is the name given to all the data in the item “Actual”. The query picks out all records where the “Budget” amount is greater than the “Actual” amount. It then causes the Department name, Budget and Actual sales figures to be printed.

Access as an Electronic Data Processing Tool¶

Example¶

Print out the names and addresses of all customers who have ordered article APB/123b

Customers	Customer number	Name	Address
	.CUSTOMERS	print.	print.

Orders	Order number	Customer number	Article	Quantity
		.CUSTOMERS	'APB/123b'

CUSTOMERS is called an EXAMPLE ELEMENT and is used to link the two tables required in this case.

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Technical Specifications¶

ACCESS runs on the following ND computers: ND SATELLITE, ND COMPACT, ND-100 CX, and all CX and CXA models in the ND-500 series.

To use the DIALOGUE family, which includes SIBAS, an ND COMPACT or larger machine is required. ACCESS requires the operating system SINTRAN III (version I or later).

ACCESS may be run under the ND User Environment. One batch process is required for each ACCESS system (Data Dictionary) to be used concurrently.

ACCESS itself requires approx 1 MB disk space for its 6 program segments, and 1 data segment of 128 KB for each concurrent user on the ND-100 series machines.

The minimum memory requirement for an ND-100 ACCESS system is 1/4 MB plus approx. 100 KB for each user after the first.

On ND-500 systems, ACCESS requires approx. 1 MB of disk space plus about 1/2 MB for each user. The minimum memory requirement is 1 MB.

The amount of mass storage required is dependent on the application, and the amount of data to be stored.

Documentation¶

Document	Reference
ACCESS User Guide	ND-60.153 EN
ACCESS CBA Manual	ND-30.022 EN

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