Personal work-stations at the University of Waterloo

ABSTRACT

Students and faculty at the University of Waterloo are using the IBM Personal Computer as a powerful workstation to develop programs, and do their applications. The PCs are connected using two different network technologies. In one case, the PCs are connected into a micro-mainframe network called Waterloo PC Network, which allows both files and software to be located in a centralized file system accessed from any PC. Since the language and applications software is portable and runs on both the mainframe or micro the user may choose to run an application on the computer that is appropriate for the size of the job. In the other case, the PCs are connected to another PC which acts as a file and print server. In both cases, the workstations do not have any local file storage. The talk will describe the design goals for PC Networks, their design, current applications, and future plans.

Index Terms

• Applied computing

  • Computers in other domains

    • Personal computers and PC applications

• Hardware

  • Communication hardware, interfaces and storage

• Networks

  • Network protocols