National CSS
Encyclopedia
National CSS, Inc. was a time-sharing
firm in the 1960-80s, until its acquisition by Dun & Bradstreet
in 1979. NCSS was originally headquartered in Norwalk, Connecticut
, but relocated to Wilton
in 1978. Sales offices, data centers, and development facilities were located at various sites throughout the U.S. Additional sales offices were active in the UK and elsewhere.
. After IBM released CP/CMS
under the IBM Type-III Library
in 1968, and thus became available to CSS, this dream became possible. The small firm persuaded IBM to take an order for a S/360-67, and key technical people were recruited.The machine was delivered in November 1968. Harold Feinleib, an early recruit from MIT, describes the situation:
By December 1968, the firm was reselling time. Needing more capital to expand, the company went public in 1970, changing its name to "National CSS" (because "CSS" was not available nationwide). After a couple of hard years, business took off in the mid 70s.
operating system, and the NOMAD
database system.
When NCSS began selling remote access to its computers, it was selling to an industry where in-house programmers did their development via batch processing on punched cards. Feinleib describes their early appeal:
Later, as time-sharing became available in more development shops, the NCSS customer base gradually shifted to a larger proportion of end-users who were trying to solve information problems without using their in-house MIS departments. By the late 1970s, the main source of NCSS business growth was its NOMAD product, well-suited for such users.
At the time of the D&B acquisition, a follow-on technology was under development that would merge advanced operating system and database concepts. The project was abandoned. Instead, NOMAD was ported to IBM's VM/370 operating system, and soon VP/CSS was also abandoned.
An innovative, nationwide packet-switching network, running primarily on DEC PDP-11
s, provided access between modem banks and up to a dozen large IBM and Amdahl
mainframes. This network also provided interconnections between mainframes.
Various distributed applications at NCSS pioneered early implementations of teleconferencing, inter-user messaging, client/server database processing (before commercial SQL
systems existed), and file sharing
, both on a single machine and between machines. (An interprocess communication interface, for example, was implemented providing transparent read/write access between remote applications – using normal file system I/O, analogous to a UNIX pipe. This let applications on different mainframes exchange data without the need for any software modification.)
Feinleib relates a telling story about NCSS customer support, and how a problem at Bell Labs was resolved:
In this climate, NCSS built a strong support and consulting organization, able to help end-users bypass their in-house technical resources. This organization allowed the NCSS sales force to ignore traditional data processing procurement routes; they could instead sell directly to line managers with discretionary budgets and revenue responsibility. Doing so flew in the face of the technology establishment, which had hitherto maintained tight control over all technical decisions. Empowered end users were now able to ask and answer their own questions, without having to deal with the intermediary of a Computer Science professional. This released many frustrations, and helped changed expectations about the role of information technology. Agile companies exploited this situation, and out-competed their slower-paced rivals.
These changes fostered a transformation of business structures of the 80s and 90s, forcing technical resources to respond more directly to corporate and customer needs, and encouraging the creation of new user-centered methodologies (such as rapid prototyping
and joint application design
). End user access to interactive computer systems was a key step in this change.
Ironically, the same users who used timesharing to outfox their MIS departments eventually became early adopters of PC technology. This shift ultimately marked the end of the timesharing industry – which was unable to exploit or even embrace the paradigm shift that it helped create.
community; and they in turn attracted other strong hires. A major appeal was the fact that, aside from hardware vendors, NCSS was one of very few organizations doing large-scale in-house operating system development. Moreover, the firm's small size, high-profile clients, and rapidly changing application needs meant that an individual developer or support person was likely to encounter many different challenging problems each month. The NCSS diaspora of the late 70s and early 80s helped seed many successful R&D groups and products with independent thinkers. Robert E. Weissman, who led NCSS when Dun & Bradstreet acquired it, later became chairman of Dun & Bradstreet and, after D&B spun IMS Health off, chairman of IMS Health.
scandal. A lengthy New York Times article of 26 July 1981, by Vin McLellan, described how the NCSS master password list had been compromised – and how a thorough follow-up by the FBI became a learning experience for them.http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/26/business/case-of-the-purloined-password.html They learned all about how (and why) a young, bored technician might poke around a computer system, just to see what interesting things might be found. In this case, although the security breach was extensive, there was apparently no malicious intent or damage done. Instead, a Kilroy was here
attitude got a careless hacker into a great deal of hot water. The lessons learned – by NCSS, by D&B (its new masters), by the compromised clients, by the FBI, by the interested newspaper reporters, and ultimately by the reading public – helped raise awareness about security issues, in an industry that had been blithely indifferent to such risks.
Time-sharing
Time-sharing is the sharing of a computing resource among many users by means of multiprogramming and multi-tasking. Its introduction in the 1960s, and emergence as the prominent model of computing in the 1970s, represents a major technological shift in the history of computing.By allowing a large...
firm in the 1960-80s, until its acquisition by Dun & Bradstreet
Dun & Bradstreet
Dun & Bradstreet is a Fortune 500 public company headquartered in Short Hills, New Jersey, USA that provides information on businesses and corporations for use in credit decisions, B2B marketing and supply chain management...
in 1979. NCSS was originally headquartered in Norwalk, Connecticut
Norwalk, Connecticut
Norwalk is a city in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. According to the 2010 U.S. Census, the population of the city is 85,603, making Norwalk sixth in population in Connecticut, and third in Fairfield County...
, but relocated to Wilton
Wilton, Connecticut
Wilton is a town nestled in the Norwalk River Valley in southwestern Connecticut in the United States. It is located in Fairfield County. As of the 2010 census, the town population was 18,062. In 2007, it was voted as one of CNN Money's "Best Places to Live" in the United States.Located along...
in 1978. Sales offices, data centers, and development facilities were located at various sites throughout the U.S. Additional sales offices were active in the UK and elsewhere.
Early history
The firm began life in 1966 as Computer Software Systems, a consulting firm. In 1967, joined by Dick Orenstein (one of the authors of CTSS), the company began exploring the idea of offering time-sharing services based on CP/CMSCP/CMS
CP/CMS was a time-sharing operating system of the late 60s and early 70s, known for its excellent performance and advanced features...
. After IBM released CP/CMS
CP/CMS
CP/CMS was a time-sharing operating system of the late 60s and early 70s, known for its excellent performance and advanced features...
under the IBM Type-III Library
IBM Type-III Library
The IBM Type-III Library was software provided by IBM to its customers, available without charge, liability, or support, and typically in source-code format...
in 1968, and thus became available to CSS, this dream became possible. The small firm persuaded IBM to take an order for a S/360-67, and key technical people were recruited.The machine was delivered in November 1968. Harold Feinleib, an early recruit from MIT, describes the situation:
I couldn’t imagine what the IBM people must have been thinking. This machine cost close to $100K a month to rent so I am sure they were quite concerned to accept the order from a couple of young guys. Even most big companies didn’t have machines this powerful. This was their latest technology and we were one of the first to order one.
By December 1968, the firm was reselling time. Needing more capital to expand, the company went public in 1970, changing its name to "National CSS" (because "CSS" was not available nationwide). After a couple of hard years, business took off in the mid 70s.
Products
NCSS was best known for two products: the VP/CSSVP/CSS
VP/CSS was a time-sharing operating system developed by National CSS. It began life in 1968 as a copy of IBM's CP/CMS, which at the time was distributed to IBM customers at no charge, in source code form, without support, as part of the IBM Type-III Library...
operating system, and the NOMAD
Nomad software
Nomad Software is a relational database and fourth-generation language , originally developed in the 70s by time-sharing vendor National CSS, Inc...
database system.
- VP/CSSVP/CSSVP/CSS was a time-sharing operating system developed by National CSS. It began life in 1968 as a copy of IBM's CP/CMS, which at the time was distributed to IBM customers at no charge, in source code form, without support, as part of the IBM Type-III Library...
was derived from a copy of CP/CMSCP/CMSCP/CMS was a time-sharing operating system of the late 60s and early 70s, known for its excellent performance and advanced features...
, but these systems diverged considerably over the following 10–15 years. VP/CSS initially ran on the IBM System/360-67; it was ported to the System/370System/370The IBM System/370 was a model range of IBM mainframes announced on June 30, 1970 as the successors to the System/360 family. The series maintained backward compatibility with the S/360, allowing an easy migration path for customers; this, plus improved performance, were the dominant themes of the...
series after IBM added virtual memory to these machines in 1972. Through extensive in-house software development, VP/CSS enabled NCSS's profitable resale of interactive computer time, which began in December 1968. Robust performance, and a suite of interactive development tools, attracted the interest of clients previously shackled by traditional in-house punched cardPunched cardA punched card, punch card, IBM card, or Hollerith card is a piece of stiff paper that contains digital information represented by the presence or absence of holes in predefined positions...
/batch operations and unsupportive technicians. VP/CSS earned a reputation for capacity and efficiency.
- NOMADNomad softwareNomad Software is a relational database and fourth-generation language , originally developed in the 70s by time-sharing vendor National CSS, Inc...
was another project led by Feinlieb and was built to exploit the NCSS market position. It delivered an interactive database management environment based on relational database theory, a new concept of the day. NOMAD was primarily sold to meet end-user and ad hoc needs, such as sales analysis and financial modeling – needs that were often unmet by the corporate ADP/MIS groups of the day.
When NCSS began selling remote access to its computers, it was selling to an industry where in-house programmers did their development via batch processing on punched cards. Feinleib describes their early appeal:
In those days, COBOL programmers could get one or possibly two turnarounds a day because their in-house machines were used for production work most of the time. They worked with punched cards, so any slight error would waste a run and a whole day. On our system, which used the same IBM COBOL compiler, they could get dozens of turnarounds a day. They would use an IBM Selectric Typewriter terminal to edit and enter their program, and then they could run and debug it. We enabled them to put in test data and even added a symbolic debugger so they could debug their programs interactively. This program development service sold like hot-cakes.
Later, as time-sharing became available in more development shops, the NCSS customer base gradually shifted to a larger proportion of end-users who were trying to solve information problems without using their in-house MIS departments. By the late 1970s, the main source of NCSS business growth was its NOMAD product, well-suited for such users.
At the time of the D&B acquisition, a follow-on technology was under development that would merge advanced operating system and database concepts. The project was abandoned. Instead, NOMAD was ported to IBM's VM/370 operating system, and soon VP/CSS was also abandoned.
Clients
NCSS achieved major successes with large banks, oil companies, pharmaceutical firms, and manufacturers, as well as many smaller clients. Important application areas included database publishing, financial analysis/modeling, engineering, sales analysis, bill-of-materials processing, statistics/crosstabulation, mailing list administration, patent management, and interactive software development.Connectivity
Most customers connected to the NCSS system using dial-up terminals and modems: 110 or 300 baud was typical for the early years; 1200 baud became more common after the mid 70s. Some customers installed conditioned telephone circuits for constant higher-speed access.An innovative, nationwide packet-switching network, running primarily on DEC PDP-11
PDP-11
The PDP-11 was a series of 16-bit minicomputers sold by Digital Equipment Corporation from 1970 into the 1990s, one of a succession of products in the PDP series. The PDP-11 replaced the PDP-8 in many real-time applications, although both product lines lived in parallel for more than 10 years...
s, provided access between modem banks and up to a dozen large IBM and Amdahl
Amdahl Corporation
Amdahl Corporation is an information technology company which specializes in IBM mainframe-compatible computer products. Founded in 1970 by Dr. Gene Amdahl, a former IBM employee, it has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Fujitsu since 1997...
mainframes. This network also provided interconnections between mainframes.
Various distributed applications at NCSS pioneered early implementations of teleconferencing, inter-user messaging, client/server database processing (before commercial SQL
SQL
SQL is a programming language designed for managing data in relational database management systems ....
systems existed), and file sharing
File sharing
File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digitally stored information, such as computer programs, multimedia , documents, or electronic books. It may be implemented through a variety of ways...
, both on a single machine and between machines. (An interprocess communication interface, for example, was implemented providing transparent read/write access between remote applications – using normal file system I/O, analogous to a UNIX pipe. This let applications on different mainframes exchange data without the need for any software modification.)
Services
The nature of computer time-sharing was that a dissatisfied customer could always "hang up the phone." This put great pressure on time-sharing vendors to provide attractive levels of performance and support. Hardware vendors of the day saw different priorities; they did not focus on consistent day-to-day support. Likewise, the in-house systems groups responsible for mainstream data processing were often seen as unresponsive by their end users.Feinleib relates a telling story about NCSS customer support, and how a problem at Bell Labs was resolved:
One day something happened to the disk they had their files on. It was a hardware failure. Now that wasn’t a problem because we did routine backups of all our customer files. Except, for some reason we didn’t backup Bell Labs files.... [I told the salesman to] tell them exactly what happened – that we screwed up and didn’t back up their files. Explain how it happened and then say that we will do anything to help them get their data back. He sucked in his gut and did it. After the initial shock, the folks at Bell Labs rolled up their sleeves with us and gathered stacks and stacks of printouts that we used to get their data keypunched, which we reloaded into the system. The way we handled this problem so impressed Bell Labs that they went on to become a much larger customer than ever before.... [Customers understand] that technology is fragile, and having confidence in their vendor relationship is the most important thing.
In this climate, NCSS built a strong support and consulting organization, able to help end-users bypass their in-house technical resources. This organization allowed the NCSS sales force to ignore traditional data processing procurement routes; they could instead sell directly to line managers with discretionary budgets and revenue responsibility. Doing so flew in the face of the technology establishment, which had hitherto maintained tight control over all technical decisions. Empowered end users were now able to ask and answer their own questions, without having to deal with the intermediary of a Computer Science professional. This released many frustrations, and helped changed expectations about the role of information technology. Agile companies exploited this situation, and out-competed their slower-paced rivals.
These changes fostered a transformation of business structures of the 80s and 90s, forcing technical resources to respond more directly to corporate and customer needs, and encouraging the creation of new user-centered methodologies (such as rapid prototyping
Rapid prototyping
Rapid prototyping is the automatic construction of physical objects using additive manufacturing technology. The first techniques for rapid prototyping became available in the late 1980s and were used to produce models and prototype parts. Today, they are used for a much wider range of applications...
and joint application design
Joint application design
Joint application design is a process used in the prototyping life cycle area of the Dynamic Systems Development Method to collect business requirements while developing new information systems for a company...
). End user access to interactive computer systems was a key step in this change.
Ironically, the same users who used timesharing to outfox their MIS departments eventually became early adopters of PC technology. This shift ultimately marked the end of the timesharing industry – which was unable to exploit or even embrace the paradigm shift that it helped create.
People
NCSS attracted an unusual cadre of innovative people. Its early technical team included leading lights from MIT and the CP/CMSCP/CMS
CP/CMS was a time-sharing operating system of the late 60s and early 70s, known for its excellent performance and advanced features...
community; and they in turn attracted other strong hires. A major appeal was the fact that, aside from hardware vendors, NCSS was one of very few organizations doing large-scale in-house operating system development. Moreover, the firm's small size, high-profile clients, and rapidly changing application needs meant that an individual developer or support person was likely to encounter many different challenging problems each month. The NCSS diaspora of the late 70s and early 80s helped seed many successful R&D groups and products with independent thinkers. Robert E. Weissman, who led NCSS when Dun & Bradstreet acquired it, later became chairman of Dun & Bradstreet and, after D&B spun IMS Health off, chairman of IMS Health.
Hacking
NCSS was the subject of a well-publicized computer hackingHacker (computer security)
In computer security and everyday language, a hacker is someone who breaks into computers and computer networks. Hackers may be motivated by a multitude of reasons, including profit, protest, or because of the challenge...
scandal. A lengthy New York Times article of 26 July 1981, by Vin McLellan, described how the NCSS master password list had been compromised – and how a thorough follow-up by the FBI became a learning experience for them.http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/26/business/case-of-the-purloined-password.html They learned all about how (and why) a young, bored technician might poke around a computer system, just to see what interesting things might be found. In this case, although the security breach was extensive, there was apparently no malicious intent or damage done. Instead, a Kilroy was here
Kilroy was here
Kilroy was here is an American popular culture expression, often seen in graffiti. Its origins are debated, but the phrase and the distinctive accompanying doodle—a bald-headed man with a prominent nose peeking over a wall with the fingers of each hand clutching the wall—is widely known among U.S...
attitude got a careless hacker into a great deal of hot water. The lessons learned – by NCSS, by D&B (its new masters), by the compromised clients, by the FBI, by the interested newspaper reporters, and ultimately by the reading public – helped raise awareness about security issues, in an industry that had been blithely indifferent to such risks.
External links
- Oral history interview with Bernard Goldstein, Charles Babbage InstituteCharles Babbage InstituteThe Charles Babbage Institute is a research center at the University of Minnesota specializing in the history of information technology, particularly the history since 1935 of digital computing, programming/software, and computer networking....
, University of Minnesota. Goldstein joined National CSS before it was sold to Dun & Bradstreet. - CP/CMSCP/CMSCP/CMS was a time-sharing operating system of the late 60s and early 70s, known for its excellent performance and advanced features...
- History of CP/CMSHistory of CP/CMSThis article covers the History of CP/CMS — the historical context in which this important IBM time-sharing virtual machine operating system was built. It provides details to support the main CP/CMS and History of IBM articles, drawing on source material that is not readily available on-line.CP/CMS...