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38-447: DEC Professional could refer to: DEC Professional (computer) , a line of PDP-11 -based personal computers from Digital Equipment Corporation The DEC Professional , a now-defunct magazine for administrators and managers of computer systems from Digital Equipment Corporation Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with

76-546: A B-spline package and improved refresh performance led to adoption by many large customers, including Boeing , which purchased dozens of systems for the 757/767 aircraft program. Improved 3-D design was added in the early 1980s with the CADDS4 product on the CGP200. This version of CADDS moved display technology from storage tube base displays to raster graphics and introduced the dedicated graphics co-processor board known as

114-495: A combination digitizer and plotter mounted on a large drafting table. Integrated circuit layout was added with the CADDS-2 product, which had a dedicated operating system and a 16-bit graphic database. When this proved insufficient resolution for VLSI (very large scale integration), the company developed CADDS-2/VLSI in the late 1970s. CADDS-2/VLSI included a new operating system, a 32-bit database, and user expandability through

152-418: A dedicated programming language called ICPL (integrated circuit programming language), which was a dialect of BASIC , based on an interpreter licensed from Fairchild Semiconductor . The original CADDS-2 ran on Data General Nova 1200 computers. CADDS-2/VLSI ran on Computervision's own hardware/software which was a modified Data General Nova with a modified version of DG's RDOS operating system. CADDS3

190-658: A division of John Laing, had for some time been sponsoring work at Imperial University on the use of CAD in construction in the early 1970s and this led to Laing choosing the ComputerVision platform. At this time, Laing became the first CAD user in the UK Civil Engineering and Construction industry and were instrumental in developing and promoting the use of Computers in Construction. Mervyn Richards, responsible for this initiative later became one of

228-554: A menu-driven core user interface. Industry critics complained that this user interface was awkward, slow, and inflexible, offering few advantages over the command-line based MS-DOS user interface that was coming into widespread use. Other available operating systems include DEC RT-11 , VenturCom Venix , and 2.9BSD Unix . Later, the Professional 380 ( PRO-380 ) was introduced using the much faster J-11 chip set (as used in 11/73 systems). However, due to clocking issues on

266-651: A partnership with Prime Computer which maintained its option on the MEDUSA source code. At the time, MEDUSA was available on the then newly released 32-bit so-called super mini computers, whose most prominent distributors were Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) (with their VAX hardware) and Prime Computer. In 1984 there was a fork in MEDUSA as Prime took its option to keep developing MEDUSA. This in effect created two different versions of MEDUSA: CIS MEDUSA (owned by Computervision, which ran on Prime, Sun and VAX workstations) and Prime MEDUSA (which only ran on Prime computers at

304-573: A programmable peripheral interface (PPI) consisting of three 8-bit ports for transferring data, address, and control signals between the console and the VAX console interface. The Pro had highly advanced graphic capabilities for its time. The graphic card for the Pro 325/350 has 32 KB of RAM and can display two-color screens at either 1024x240@60Hz or 1024x256@50Hz. It can also display 512 pixels per line when each pixel has 4 levels of intensity. The other option

342-581: A scientific workstation, where the market was also headed to Intel 8086 , or alternately to Motorola 68000 -based computers. The failure of DEC to gain a significant foothold in the high-volume PC market would be the beginning of the end of the computer hardware industry in New England, as nearly all computer companies located there were focused on minicomputers for large organizations, from DEC to Data General , Wang , Prime , Computervision , Honeywell , and Symbolics Inc. The PRO-325 and -350 use

380-420: Is 256 pixels per line when each pixel has 16 levels of intensity. The standard software only uses the 1024x240 mode. Moreover the standard software uses only 960 pixels out 1024. To display colors, an additional card should be installed, which adds 64 KB of RAM. This card enables to display 8 colors per pixel using a 256-color palette. This is mapped mode. The standard software uses only this mode. However it

418-404: Is possible to use the unmapped graphic mode when each graphic plane provides intensity for its base color. This allows 4096 colors to be displayed simultaneously when 256 pixels are displayed per line, or 64 colors when 512 pixels are displayed per line. The Pro 380 graphics is more advanced. The standard graphic card is integrated into the motherboard. The card has 128 KB of memory. This enables

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456-574: The 1980s, Computervision rewrote their code to operate on Unix -based platforms. Computervision was acquired by Prime Computer in 1988 for $ 434 million. Prime subsequently adopted the Computervision name. On December 12, 1998 Parametric Technology Corporation acquired Computervision. Computervision's first product, CADDS-1, was aimed at the printed circuit board layout and 2-D drafting markets. CADDS stood for Computervison Automated Design and Drafting System. The CADDS-1 system featured

494-649: The F-11 chipset (as used in LSI-11/23 systems) to create a single-board PDP-11 with up to six expansion slots of a proprietary CTI (Computing Terminal Interconnect) bus using 90-pin ZIF connectors. The PRO family uses dual RX50 floppy drives for storage; the PRO-325 has only floppies, and the 350 and 380 also include an internal hard drive. Mainline PDP-11s generally use separate serial terminals as console and display devices;

532-588: The Graphics Processing Unit (GPU). With CADDS4, tailored packages were available for CAD drafting, CAM ( computer-aided manufacturing ), 3-D modeling, piping and plant design, printed circuit board layout, instrument panel design, and many other applications. During this period, they also contributed to the development of the IGES standard for CAD/CAM data exchange, along with Applicon and other competitors. The major breakthrough in 3-D Design

570-625: The PC outperformed the same operating system on the DEC Professional and PDP-11/23. Further, although the PDP-11 was a very successful minicomputer, it lacked a wide base of affordable small business software. By comparison, many existing CP/M applications (see the Rainbow 100 ) were easily ported to the similar 8086/8088 chips and MS-DOS operating system. Porting existing PDP-11 software to

608-479: The PDP-11 microprocessors are technically superior to the Intel-based chips. While the 8088 is restricted to 1MB of memory because of its 20-bit address bus, DEC microprocessors are capable of accessing 4MB with their 22-bit addressing (although direct addressing of memory is limited in both approaches to 64KB segments, limiting the size of individual code and data objects). BYTE in 1984 reported that Venix on

646-484: The PRO family uses built-in bit-mapped graphics to drive a combined console and display. All other I/O devices in the PRO family are also different (in most cases, radically different) from their counterparts on other PDP-11 models. For example, while the internal bus supports direct memory access (DMA), none of the available I/O devices actually use this feature. The interrupt system is implemented using Intel PC chips of

684-403: The PRO was complicated by design decisions that rendered it partially incompatible with its parent product line. Industry critics observed that this incompatibility appeared at least in part deliberate, as DEC belatedly sought to "protect" its more-profitable mainstream PDP-11s from price competition with lower-priced PCs. The PRO was never widely accepted as an office personal computer, nor as

722-520: The cosmetically similar Rainbow 100 and DECmate II (also introduced at that time), the PRO series uses the LK201 keyboard and 400KB single-sided quad-density floppy disk drives (known as RX50 ), and offers a choice of color or monochrome monitors. For DEC, none of the three would be favorably received, and the industry instead standardized on Intel 8088 -based IBM PC compatibles which are all binary program compatible with each other. In some ways,

760-637: The featured graduation speaker. The first graduating class of 18 students had over 75 job offers, launching a 20-year history of unparalleled placement success. One of the numerous "firsts" that was spun off the Alfred State program was a joint project with the New York State Department of Transportation, Region 6, to design highways and bridges and associated structures in 3-D CADDs which resulted in New York State being one of

798-517: The first major customers in the UK for ComputerVision were the construction company John Laing PLC. "In 1975 John Laing purchased a ComputerVision CADDS3 computer aided design and drafting system to carry out investigations into the use of CAD in the construction engineering and building environment" - Mervyn Richards, Laing Technology Group (Thomas Telford Press, Institute of Civil Engineers, Conference - ISBN   0-7277-1340-X ) Laing Design Partners,

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836-762: The first to use CADDS for highway design. In 1981 the United States Navy awarded an “ indefinite quantity, indefinite delivery contract valued at $ 63,000,000 for Designer V hardware, CADDS4 software, services, and training. Primarily used by the Navy Laboratories, in the 1985 time frame, CADDS was adopted by the Navy shipyards to support waterfront activities, and the Naval Sea Systems Command to support contract ship design. As of 2013, CADDS (by then CADDS5) continued in production as

874-531: The industries leading experts in Computer Aided Design, Modeling and construction IT (see the BS1192 specification). His work with CADDS3, ComputerVision and Elstree Computing Limited lead to the development and distribution of many software tools for ComputerVision platforms, promoting their use and popularising the platform for many years - right up to CADDS5. The Queen Alia Airport , by example,

912-506: The microelectronic CAD market) in 1989. Computervision was acquired by Parametric Technology Corporation (PTC) in 1998, which (as of 2013) still produces the CADDS5 product, although only as a CAD/CAM product specialized for shipbuilding. In 2001, PTC sold the MEDUSA and MPDS Plant Design System software rights to CAD Schroer, which has developed a Fourth Generation of each system. One of

950-608: The motherboard, the J-11 chip runs at 10 MHz instead of 16-18 MHz, thus making the PRO-380 slower than a stock 11/73 system. The DEC Professional Series PC-38N is a PRO-380 with a real-time interface (RTI) that is used as the console for the VAX 8500 and 8550 . The RTI has two serial line units: one connects to the VAX environmental monitoring module (EMM) and the other is a spare that can be used for data transfer. The RTI also has

988-437: The time of acquisition, but which Prime subsequently ported to SunOS as Prime MEDUSA version 5.0). The two versions had a slightly different file format and the development language was developed in slightly different directions. The split in MEDUSA development was merged when Prime Computers acquired Computervision, with the promise to CV customers that VAX and Sun users would not be forced to switch to Prime workstations. Prime

1026-427: The time, which again makes it very different from the PDP-11 standard interrupt architecture. For all these reasons, support of the PRO family requires extensive modifications to the previously-existing operating system software, and the PRO cannot run standard PDP-11 software without modification. The default PRO-3xx operating system is DEC's Professional Operating System ( P/OS ), a modified version of RSX-11 M with

1064-483: The title DEC Professional . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=DEC_Professional&oldid=1037942461 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages DEC Professional (computer) Like

1102-545: The twenty-first century. As of 2019, CADDS (now at version CADDS5) was offered as a CAD/CAM system specialized for shipbuilding. In 1983 Computervision purchased Cambridge Interactive Systems (CIS), founded by British computer scientist Dr. Dick Newell and Tom Sancha. Computervision was interested in obtaining some of the state-of-the-art technology of the MEDUSA CAD system the Cambridge company had developed. CIS had

1140-645: The use of interlaced modes, which double the vertical resolution. The optional color supplement card adds 256 KB of RAM. The Pro 380 color graphics enables the use of 4096 palette colors in mapped mode. The Pro 380 can hold 4 uninterlaced pictures or 2 interlaced in its video RAM. Like the PDP-8 and PDP-11 before it, the Professional 350 was cloned by Elektronika in the Soviet Union . Other PDP-11 clones: Computervision Computervision, Inc. (CV)

1178-568: Was a classic project to which these systems were used (by John Laing PLC). The first higher educational user of Computervision equipment was State University of New York College of Technology at Alfred, New York which acquired a CADDS3 system in 1979 with the help of a NSF grant and generous donation of equipment by Computervision employees Virgil Ross, Drew Davis and Bob Gothie. Alfred State graduated their first AAS Computer Graphics Engineering Technology (TAC/ABET) Graduates in 1983 with Martin Allen as

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1216-620: Was an early pioneer in Computer Aided Design and Manufacturing ( CAD / CAM ). Computervision was founded in 1969 by Marty Allen and Philippe Villers , and headquartered in Bedford, Massachusetts , United States. Its early products were built on a Data General Nova platform. Starting around 1975, Computervision built its own "CGP" (Computervision Graphics Processor) Nova-compatible 16-bit computers with added instructions optimized for graphics applications and using its own operating system known as Computervision Graphic Operating System (CGOS). In

1254-575: Was crucial to Sun Microsystems development as a company. CV was Sun's first large customer for Unix -based workstations. The CDS3000 series of workstations were actually Sun-2 systems with additional graphics hardware from CV. Ultimately in 1987, CV migrated from the CGP systems to Sun-3 -based workstations known as CADDStations with a VME bus version of the GPU. Computervision merged with Prime Computer in 1988 and acquired GE Calma (its major competitor in

1292-495: Was divided into the two main divisions: Prime Hardware, which was responsible for the proprietary computer hardware, and Prime Computervision, which was responsible for the CAD/CAM business with MEDUSA and CADDS. With falling hardware sales Prime eventually stopped production of PRIMOS computers and transferred its maintenance obligations to another company, thus being able to concentrate on the CAD/CAM software business. The company

1330-575: Was introduced in the late 1970s on the CGP80 and CGP100 using Tektronix storage tube vector devices as display terminals and graphics tablets with menus for operator input. CADDS3 was written in Fortran and based on software developed by Patrick Hanratty and acquired from S Corporation around 1973. In 1975, Computervision introduced an improved database that allowed additional entities and data types to be introduced easily. Other improvements, including

1368-556: Was renamed from Prime Computervision to Computervision (CV). Computervision created a GPU, Graphics Processing Unit, in 1980. It could traverse and render hierarchical display lists. It also produced a DCU, Display Control Unit, in 1983 with a large color raster display and attached rendering engine for basic UI operations. In 1985, CV introduced an IBM 4361-based mainframe known as the CDS5000 to support Product Data Manager (PDM). This system never ran any graphics software but instead

1406-500: Was used to manage the large number of product files and data that users were generating. The CDS5000 was networked with CDS4000 and CGP200X systems using serial links. PDM was later made platform independent and was offered on the original IBM platform, as well as DEC/VMS and Sun/Unix - opening up its CADDS workstations to run in conjunction with this range of host platforms for product data vaulting, access/security, revision control, backup/recovery, archive/restore features. Computervision

1444-622: Was with the CADDS4X on the CGP200X running CGOS200X. This version of the operating system and hardware improved memory management (not true virtual memory) and increased program size. In 1984 a cluster of CGP200X with a proprietary 32-bit processor Analytic Processing Unit (APU) was offered as the Computervision Distributed System (CDS) 4000. The APU was sometimes called "All Paws Up". CADDS production continued into

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