A communications environment emulator
Jack M. Pearlman, Richard Snyder, Richard Caplan · 1969
Communications based systems and software, especially complex systems and software, present an exceptionally difficult checkout and debug problem to the implementor. Conventional techniques require him to check his often times labyrinthine maze of response paths in a plodding, single step by single step, long drawn out and expensive manner. He checks the non-communications or non-real time portions of his program easily enough. The methods of testing standard peripheral functions are well enough known and adequate tools exist for the job. The techniques for checking basic data processing logic are available with every batch oriented system. Communication based system checkout is complicated by the real time nature of the systems. The give and take of on-line terminals, the multiplicity of choice, the need to process data in various stages of disarray, the necessity of leaving some partially complete processing sequence and returning to it at a later time, these are the problem factors. These are the things which make conventional checkout procedures a millstone around the neck of a system builder.