Conference turris::scandia

The short answer is "yes" -- my first job at Dec was a residency at
the SAAB airplane division helping them setup a flight data recorder:
they had an 11/20 connected to an 11/45 via a DMA interprocessor buffer.
The 11/20 was connected to the PCM downlink to a test plane.  It shuffled
the data into buffers and pushed the buffers over to the /45 which did
some more shuffling and put everything on disk for later analysis.

When I had my first meeting with the customer, they said they had only
one requirement for the program: it had to run for 45 minutes without
failure as they couldn't back the plane up.

Volvo is a heavy user of Dec equipment.  They have many systems on the
factory floor (process control) as well as in dealerships for inventory.
The metal plate with the vehicle ID number was at one time stamped out
by some software that I had the privilege of messing with (in case you're
wondering why the ID number looks so good!)

(My information is probably 10 years out of date -- I'm sure they have a
few Vax installations by now.)

SAAB made a mid-sized computer in the 1960's that was similar in capability
to a PDP-6.  Since it was intended for serious  users (as opposed to student
hacking), it never gained any great popularity and they more or less left
the business when they were late and over budget with a DEC-10 class machine
in the early 1970's.

The Swedish computer industry dates back to the 1950's with BESK (Binary
Electronic Sequential Calculator) which was, for all intents and purposes,
an Illiac-1 clone.  In the early 1960's, Besk's designers proposed building
super-Besk.  They were turned down in favor of an IBM 7090.  When Besk
was retired in the late 1960's, some people built a transistorized clone
(Trask) which I programmed for a few years.  (Illiac-1 was my first computer,
and I was mildly amazed to find another machine with 40-bit words.)

Fortunately, the Swedes had better programming tools than I had as an
undergraduate, including an excellent Algol-60 whose compilation speed
(with only paper tape input) compares favorably with VMS.

I still have my Besk manuals, just in case.

Martin.
 

    Datasaab made minis D15 and D16 in the 70's. Then Ericsson bought the
    company from Saab in the beginning of the 80's. D16 changed its name
    to Ericsson Series 2000 (and company changed its name from Datasaab
    to Ericsson Information Systems). And now this year Finnish Nokia
    Oy bought the most part of EIS from Ericsson and formed a company called
    Nokia Data Ab. Series 2000 is still alive (and well in Sweden and
    Finland at least, I think).

    
    	Thanks for the replies, now down to the nitty gritty. I'm a
    co-op student here in Maynard, I'll be here for the next few
    months. I've been dreaming of a co-op abroad. Perhaps Sweden.
    Working for Digital or Saab or Volvo would be great. Any
    suggestions on where one starts such a venture?
                                                   
    < Just for the record, co-op means I'm still in school, and in
    	order to get my degree, I must complete x number of hours
    	of co-op, career related work. My B.S. will be in Computer Science>

	As an ex-SAAB employee I think I can answer some of 
	Your questions.

	SAAB Aircraft division (were I used to work) are heavy
	VAX users.  They have some ~10 large clustered VAXes 
	and a few �VAXes too, they have LOTS of disks, and
	of course a CRAY 1A, and are about to take delivery
	of a CRAY X/MP-48 this year (I think).

	Volvo does use a lot of VAXes too, although a don't know
	any details.
	But I know that one heavy user of VAXes within Volvo is
	the Aircraft Engine division.

	Some addresses:

	SAAB-Scania AB
	Aircraft Division
	S-581 88 Link�ping
	SWEDEN

	SAAB-Scania AB
	Scania Division
	S-151 87 S�dert�lje
	SWEDEN

	SAAB-Scania AB
	Car Division
	S-461 88 Trollh�ttan
	SWEDEN

	Volvo-Data AB
	S-405 08 G�teborg
	SWEDEN

	Volvo Flygmotor AB		(Aircraft Engines)
	S-461 81 Trollh�ttan
	SWEDEN

	Volvo Personvagnar AB		(Car Division)
	S-405 08 G�teborg
	SWEDEN


	Hope this helps some, and don't hesitate to contact
	me if more info is needed.

	/Hasse Wallin	LKPDEE::WALLIN
			@LNK
			Int. +46 13 42 10
    

	Re: .4

	Should read:    Int. +46 13 11 42 10     !!!!!!
                                    ^^

	/Hasse

  RE: volvo and vax
  
  While in Germany, I had the opportunity to use the German Videotext service
  while at the post office and put my name down for some DEC flyers.
  I got a big package of broshures, etc. a few weeks later and
  the 1986 corporate report was in there.  It always lists case histories
  of companies who use DEC stuff and Volvo was one of those listed with
  their story and a bunch of pictures if I remember correctly.

  Chad

    RE .4 

    Thanks for the info!!!!