Chinese-American computer pioneer An Wang (1920-1990) and Wang Laboratories founded by him: some aspects of their history of interest to me - Part 3 (final part)
Last updated on 28th May 2022
To see the earlier part 2 post, please visit: Chinese-American computer pioneer An Wang (1920-1990) and Wang Laboratories founded by him: some aspects of their history of interest to me - Part 2, https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/04/chinese-american-computer-pioneer-wang_19.html .
Note: This post heavily draws on the book: Lessons by An Wang (with Eugene Linden) published in 1986, https://books.google.co.in/books/about/Lessons.html?id=CSTxxSaJPGQC&redir_esc=y . By default, "Wang writes" or "He writes" or similar words, in this post refers to what Wang has written in the Lessons book.
Sections in this post
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The section: "New sales and marketing strategy for Wang Word Processors in 1976 enables rapid penetration into Fortune 1000 office market; Wang TV ad. campaign boosts Wang (computers) name recognition; By 1978 Wang was largest supplier of CRT-based word processing systems worldwide", https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/04/chinese-american-computer-pioneer-wang_19.html#WangWPNewMktg ) of the previous post of this post series covers the rapid entry of Wang Labs. into Fortune 1000 market with its word processor systems (machines).
Wang writes in Lessons book, "Once we began selling our products to the Fortune 1000 companies, it was inevitable that someday we would run up against IBM's greatest strength: their influence over executives responsible for MIS, or management information systems. These are the people responsible for making decisions about computers dealing with data processing of various sorts: payroll applications, accounts receivable applications, and other major information needs within a corporation." Wang writes that "traditionally" such data processing applications were written for (and run on) mainframe computers with IBM being the dominant mainframe computer company dwarfing other companies in that sector.
Wang Labs. entry into Fortune 1000 companies had mainly been through office managers who liked Wang's word processor systems. But as Wang Labs. tried to move into selling MIS systems to Fortune 1000 or other large corporations, they had to deal with people senior to office managers, with these persons being strongly biased towards IBM. Wang refers to this market as "the office market".
Wang writes that this (Fortune 1000 and other big corporations) office market is attractive due to its size and stability. He writes that computer companies dependent on selling to small businesses can be badly hurt when the economy goes through a bad period, as Wang Labs. itself experienced in the early 1970s, but the larger corporations (Fortune 1000 etc.) continue to buy equipment that helps meet their long-term goals even in such times (recessions), due to the resources these companies have.
Wang states that despite intense competition, Wang Labs. was able to expand into the office market.
Wang writes that this office automation goal was converged on from two different directions, one being improved word processing system of Office Information System (OIS) and the other being the VS (Virtual Storage) line of computers.
Wang OIS is covered in another section below. This section focuses on Wang VS.
Wang's Virtual Storage (VS) line of computers
Ravi: The first computer that I used was Wang VS 80 sometime in mid 1984 as a trainee programmer in Datamatics Consultants Ltd., SEEPZ, Bombay/Mumbai, India. I should add that I think the first computer equipment that I touched in my life was the Wang VS 80 workstation/terminal as I was doing the hands-on/practical part of my above mentioned training on programming. I don't think I had touched or even directly seen (as against seeing it on a movie or TV) even a small home computer like Atari Commodore or Sinclair. Of course, I had read about computers. Note that I had studied Physics in college in Bombay in late 1970s to early 1980s (Bachelor degree - B.Sc. and some initial part of Masters degree - M.Sc. which I later dropped out of, to explore possibility of a career in computer software). At that time, in most if not all Bombay colleges, we did not have any courses in computer programming as part of Physics Bachelor's degree curriculum or first year Physics Master's degree curriculum. I think I should also mention here that in the 2000s and early 2010s, as a free service activity, I taught computer programming courses to Physics students (mainly to Mathematics and Computer Science masters students as I was associated with that department and not the Physics department), in a deemed university in India - Ravi S. Iyer's Software Lab. Courses, https://raviiyerteaches.wordpress.com/ .
I learned programming and about Operating Systems and later about Wang VS computer instruction set (similar to IBM 360/370) and such stuff on Wang VS computers. It was the foundation computer system family on which I became a capable and confident software development professional which allowed me to earn a good livelihood and lead a decent life, not only while I worked on Wang computers (till 1990), but also when I moved to other computer platforms like Unix and Microsoft Windows which I was able to learn quite easily due to the knowledge and expertise I had gained of Wang VS computer systems (from a software developer viewpoint). So I am very interested in origins of Wang VS computer systems and studied the available material on the Internet in quite some depth, some of which is shared in this post.
Readers may also want to visit my post: My Wang VS computers software development work including over 30 months of assignments at Wang US & Europe centres in 1980s, https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/03/my-wang-vs-computers-software.html .
Dr. Wang provides interesting background about motivation for Wang Labs. developing VS line of computers. In the early 1970s, Wang's main minicomputer product was Wang 2200 BASIC (covered in an earlier post of this series). As per Wang, from a large corporations point of view, the Wang 2200 had the following drawbacks:
* It did not have support for other languages like COBOL or FORTRAN (which seem to have been quite popular then as the languages used to write applications for data processing needs of large corporations).
* Due to limited internal storage capacity (I think Dr. Wang is referring computer memory - RAM), it could not run very large programs.
Wang writes, "And so we set about to design a computer that would be more suited to office use in a large corporation. This was the origin of our VS line of computers, which today (Ravi: 1986) range from small machines to the VS 300, which verges on mainframe performance."
Wang explains that VS stands for Virtual Storage, and that Virtual Storage design enables computers to run programs that are larger than the internal memory (physical RAM is what he is referring to, I think) of the machine. So "mainframe-sized programs" could be run on much cheaper Virtual Storage based machines as internal memory (RAM) was then the most expensive part of a computer.
I would like to add that when I started working on Wang VS computers (from 1984) and got better understanding of its computer architecture (from around 1986 onwards I think), Virtual Storage was more commonly referred to as Virtual Memory. The introduction section of the wiki page for it, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_memory , gives a good overview along with a very good diagram explaining it. The text of the introduction section is given below:
In computing, virtual memory, or virtual storage[b] is a memory management technique that provides an "idealized abstraction of the storage resources that are actually available on a given machine"[3] which "creates the illusion to users of a very large (main) memory".[4]
The computer's operating system, using a combination of hardware and software, maps memory addresses used by a program, called virtual addresses, into physical addresses in computer memory. Main storage, as seen by a process or task, appears as a contiguous address space or collection of contiguous segments. The operating system manages virtual address spaces and the assignment of real memory to virtual memory. Address translation hardware in the CPU, often referred to as a memory management unit (MMU), automatically translates virtual addresses to physical addresses. Software within the operating system may extend these capabilities, utilizing, e.g., disk storage, to provide a virtual address space that can exceed the capacity of real memory and thus reference more memory than is physically present in the computer.
The primary benefits of virtual memory include freeing applications from having to manage a shared memory space, ability to share memory used by libraries between processes, increased security due to memory isolation, and being able to conceptually use more memory than might be physically available, using the technique of paging or segmentation.
[References:]
b. IBM uses the term virtual storage on mainframe operating systems. This usage runs from TSS[1] on the 360/67 through z/OS,[2] on z/Architecture.
3. Bhattacharjee, Abhishek; Lustig, Daniel (2017). Architectural and Operating System Support for Virtual Memory. Morgan & Claypool Publishers. p. 1. ISBN 9781627056021. Retrieved October 16, 2017.
4. Haldar, Sibsankar; Aravind, Alex Alagarsamy (2010). Operating Systems. Pearson Education India. p. 269. ISBN 978-8131730225. Retrieved October 16, 2017.
--- end wiki extract ---
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_memory#History tells us that first implementations of Virtual Memory were in late 1950s and early 1960s with Burroughs Corporation releasing the first commercial computer with Virtual Memory in 1961. But there were some issues to be sorted out before Virtual Memory became adopted more widely in commercial computers. The wiki page says, "By 1969, the debate over virtual memory for commercial computers was over;[7] an IBM research team led by David Sayre showed that their virtual memory overlay system consistently worked better than the best manually controlled systems.[18] Throughout the 1970s, the IBM 370 series running their virtual-storage based operating systems provided a means for business users to migrate multiple older systems into fewer, more powerful, mainframes that had improved price/performance. The first minicomputer to introduce virtual memory was the Norwegian NORD-1; during the 1970s, other minicomputers implemented virtual memory, notably VAX models running VMS." [Wiki References: 7: Denning, Peter (1997). "Before Memory Was Virtual" (PDF). In the Beginning: Recollections of Software Pioneers. ; 18. Sayre, D. (1969). "Is automatic "folding" of programs efficient enough to displace manual?". Communications of the ACM. 12 (12): 656–660. doi:10.1145/363626.363629. S2CID 15655353.]
Wang writes, "We introduced the VS in October 1977." He writes that salesmen with data processing background were recruited as these persons would be experienced in dealing with MIS executives and Fortune 1000 companies.
In the Lessons book, Dr. Wang does not mention the name with which the VS was introduced in late 1977. On digging up info. from the Internet, I came across references to the Wang 2200VS computer which seems to be the first VS computer released by Wang Laboratories.
The front page and fifth page of Computerworld magazine issue dated 17th October 1977 - https://books.google.co.in/books?id=29ZDlUuGs-YC&pg=PA1&lpg=PA1 and https://books.google.co.in/books?id=29ZDlUuGs-YC&pg=PA5&lpg=PA5 - carry an article on Wang Laboratories Inc. introducing "two large-scale minicomputers last week, designed for business users with sophisticated processing needs." It states that the systems are WCS/60 and WCS/80 which are based on "the 2200VS processor". Note that WCS terminology was used in the Wang 2200 computer series and stood for Wang Computer System.
The article states that these systems "offer virtual memory capability and can accommodate up to 512K bytes of real memory". Other details mentioned include:
- 32-bit word length
- ANSI 74 Cobol, RPGII and Basic language support
- 170 instructions supported by 2200VS CPU through microprogramming, with these instructions being same as IBM 360 instructions
- CPU having 16 32-bit general-purpose registers, 4 64-bit * floating point registers and 8 32-bit control registers (* the article says 640-bit floating point registers which I think is a mistake)
- Input/Output Processors (IOPs) with its own microprocessors handle Input/Output independently allowing CPU to continue data processing
- Semiconductor memory is used with 660-nsec average access time for 2 bytes; includes 6-bit error correction code
- 64K bytes to 256K bytes memory
- Disk storage capacity from 10M bytes to 150M bytes
- 16 CRT workstations supported with each CRT having 24 lines x 80 characters per line
- Medium-sized WCS/60 system with 192K bytes memory, 6 workstations, 2 x 10 M bytes disk drives, diskette and 240 lines/per minute printer is priced at $84,800.
- 256K bytes to 512K bytes memory
- Disk storage capacity from 150M bytes to 2.3G bytes (article also says that is from supporting 8 x 288M bytes disk drives which actually comes to 2304M bytes)
- 23 CRT workstations supported with each CRT having 24 lines x 80 characters per line
- Medium-sized WCS/80 system with 384K bytes memory, 10 workstations, 3 x 75 M bytes disk drives, floppy disk and 600 lines/per minute printer is priced at $172,000.
The above pic is an advertisement of Wang 2200VS that appeared in Computerworld (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computerworld ) issue of April 17, 1978 on page 44, https://books.google.co.in/books?id=VX6vUZNX0QUC&pg=PA44&lpg=PA44 . I thank Computerworld and Wang Laboratories Inc. (and their new owners) for above pic and have presumed they will not object to me using it here as this post is freely viewable and does not have any financial profit motive whatsoever.
Ravi: http://wang2200.org/docs/datasheet/Wcs30_DataSheet.700-3610B.1-76.pdf is a January 1976 datasheet for Wang 2200 WCS/30 system which, at that time, seems to have been Wang Labs' most powerful computer. Note this system seems to have been made available from June 1975. Its key specs. are: 42.5K bytes ROM memory having BASIC Interpreter + 16K to 32K bytes RAM memory, 5M bytes to 10M bytes disk, 260K bytes diskette, CRT workstation having 16 lines of 64 characters per line, maximum of 4 workstations connected to computer, support for peripheral devices like printers and tape drives, (though Datasheet does not mention it I think there was some communication capabilities that allowed it to connect to mainframe computers), and BASIC language which was only the computer language supported on it.
The Wang 2200VS WCS/80 system, announced in October 1977, with availability from December 1977 (as per above Computerworld article), was a major step forward in Wang computer evolution as its key specs. are: 170 instructions of IBM 360 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_System/360 ), 32 bit word, 16 32-bit general-purpose registers, 4 64-bit floating point registers and 16 32-bit control registers, 256K to 512K bytes RAM memory, Virtual Memory support for 1M bytes freeing programmer to write relatively large programs without worrying about physical memory size of computer, 150M to 2304M bytes disk, CRT workstation having 24 lines of 80 characters per line, maximum of 23 workstations connected to computer, support for peripheral devices like printers and tape drives, telecommunications support to communicate with mainframes, and computer languages of (ANSI 74) COBOL, BASIC, RPGII and Assembler being supported.
I mean the Wang 2200VS WCS/80 specs. tell us that it was a full blown minicomputer which could be used to satisfy business data processing needs of medium sized companies/departmental needs of large companies. I certainly would have been able to comfortably provide a variety of computer software solutions for business data processing needs of medium sized companies on such a system in the second half of 1980s. In contrast, I would have found the Wang 2200 WCS/30 system to be very limited if I had to provide business data processing computer software solutions for medium sized companies on it.
Therefore I think the Wang 2200VS WCS/80 announced in October 1977 with availability from December 1977, is a watershed computer model for Wang Laboratories, as it would have been a serious contender for medium size companies' (and departments of large size companies') business data processing needs, whereas the earlier Wang 2200 WCS/30 announced or made available from June 1975 would have been fine for data processing needs of small businesses but not really a good candidate for data processing needs of medium sized businesses. I think Wang Labs. computer hardware & software, design and development capability, as seen by the public, made a major advance in the period from June 1975 to December 1977. I find this advance to be really awesome. I mean, Wang now was in a position to try to get into Fortune 1000 companies' data processing business needs which was a field dominated by IBM. It seems to me that the earlier Wang 2200 models like the WCS/30 would not have been seriously looked at by Fortune 1000 companies for its data processing business needs.
Was Wang 2200VS same as Wang VS 80?
As I did some reading up on info. available on the Internet on early Wang VS computer systems, I had some confusion in my mind about whether Wang 2200VS was the same as Wang VS 80. My view now is that the Wang 2200VS name announced in October 1977, over the months in 1978 was initially mentioned in official Wang documents & advertisements both as Wang 2200VS or as just Wang VS, and perhaps from sometime in mid 1978 got referred to only as Wang VS (with 2200 not being used at all).
But the first Wang 2200VS models were WCS/60 and WCS/80 with the higher WCS/80 supporting a max. of 23 workstations. There was a later Wang 2200VS model which was initially referred to as only "Wang VS" which had support for 32 workstations. This computer was surely available in early 1979 but most probably was available from mid or end 1978 itself, and this Wang VS computer in later years (from early 1980s perhaps) was referred to as "Wang VS 80".
The confusion is that Wang 2200VS WCS/60 and WCS/80 as well as later Wang VS 80 (then called only Wang VS), were all referred to in articles in 1977 and 1978 as Wang VS computer! [Perhaps from early 1980s, Wang VS (32 workstations support computer) was called Wang VS 80 to differentiate it from computers like Wang VS 100, Wang VS 45, Wang VS 90 etc.]
So I now have the view that Wang 2200VS WCS/60 and WCS/80 were the first Wang Virtual Storage - Wang VS - computers (having support for virtual memory/virtual storage) and that they were earlier models with slightly lesser capability than the Wang VS 80. In other words, Wang VS 80 (with 32 workstations supported) was slightly different from the above computer models, and so Wang VS 80 cannot be said to be the first Virtual Storage computer - Wang VS - introduced by Wang Laboratories. More details about this matter are provided later on in this section.
[28th May 2022: Link is broken now] http://www.textfiles.com/bitsavers/pdf/wang/vs/brochures/2200VS_Brochure_Dec77.pdf seems to be a December 1977 Wang brochure (6 pages) for the Wang 2200VS. Most of its text contents are reproduced below to give us an idea about the system capabilities. Note that some of this text is promotional material which may involve exaggeration.
--- start most of the text in 2200VS_Brochure_Dec77.pdf ---
Simple Sophistication.
The Wang2200VS.
Wang's new 2200VS processor adds simplicity to computer sophistication and power.
We call it the new generation of computers because the 2200VS enables the business executive not only to use computer-generated information, but to shape the information as it comes to him, and actively participate in its generation.
Covering a broad spectrum from small to medium-scale computer systems, with additional optional memory, disk drives and a broad choice of peripherals, the 2200VS is so powerful it can meet the needs of about 80 percent of current and potential computer users.
Its features, combined with an outstanding price/performance ratio, make the 2200VS relevant to today's business world.
Relevant: The Wang 2200VS is user-oriented. Anyone can use it.
Relevant: The Wang 2200VS serves many different types of users and runs many jobs simultaneously.
Relevant: The Wang 2200VS protects your future. It grows with you as your business grows.
Relevant: The Wang 2200VS is for the first-time user. It offers ease of program development and implementation, power, and a smooth growth path from a small to a medium-scale computer. At a lower price than other systems in its performance range.
Relevant: The Wang 2200VS is for the large corporation. Its power, ease of operation and programming contribute uniquely to the benefits of distributed data processing.
Relevant: The Wang 2200VS is user-oriented. Call it menu-driven, conversational or interactive. Wang's 2200VS communicates with you and you communicate with it. Through fill-in-the-blanks or selection of a function from a menu on the system's CRT screen.
Imagine sitting for the first time in your life before a computer. Your reaction is panic. Your first thought almost certainly is "help!". And there it is, the HELP key. Press it and you get the first system menu. It will lead you through all the steps necessary to do what you want to do.
The HELP key symbolizes Wang's concern with the actual user who, now, can sit down at a computer and get what he or she wants. No other system offers this degree of user interaction.
And, imagine your staff sitting down at a workstation, starting to learn a job simply by answering the computer's questions. The system menu will step your staff through the execution of a program in a way that is almost self-teaching. And when you or your staff do make a mistake, the system is extremely forgiving.
Relevant: The Wang 2200VS handles many users, many jobs. In any company, small or large, there is always more than one job to be done and more than one user to be accommodated. There are orders to enter, goods to be shipped, invoices to be created and printed, inventory to be controlled. You need reports - on stock status, aged accounts receivable, transactions with your vendors, sales commission breakdowns, payroll.
The 2200VS can handle all these jobs, all simultaneously. The system is so responsive you think you have all system resources to yourself.
In addition, the 2200VS, because it is a multi-job, multi-user system with a common data base, has an integrating effect on the applications run on the system. Giving each authorized user access to other users' data files, it integrates the different user functions into one overall system.
Relevant: The Wang 2200VS protects your future. Like no other system, the 2200VS protects the future of your business. It can be built from a low-cost, extremely powerful entry-level system to a system that gives you the power of a medium-scale computer at a quarter of the traditional cost of such a system.
Its smallest configuration, the system WCS/60, includes 64K bytes of memory, one workstation, one 10-megabyte disk drive, one diskette drive and a 240 line per minute printer.
Its largest configuration, the system WCS/80, can include up to 23 workstations, up to eight 288-megabyte disk drives, optional 9-track magnetic tape drives, one diskette drive and printers of various speeds.
Spanning a range from 10 megabytes to 2.3 billion of online disk storage and high-speed semi-conductor memory from 64K to 512K bytes, the 2200VS offers expandability which is without parallel in its class.
With a continuous, uninterrupted growth path from a small WCS/60 to an expanded WCS/80 system, with onsite upgrades simply through adding memory and peripherals, your investment remains protected as with no other system. Indeed, your hardware protects your software investment as well. Because your application software runs independent of system size.
Offering telecommunications options with most industry protocols, Wang's 2200VS, no matter in what configuration, can serve as an independent, standalone system or within a distributed data processing network.
Relevant: For the first-time user. The 2200VS's low entry-level price, its power combined with its simple, end-user oriented operation, its expandability, and ease of programming make it truly the first-time user's system.
The 2200VS is a system for you and everyone in your office. You can walk up to it, key in a few responses to the system's screen prompts and get the answers you are looking for, right there and then.
The transition from manual or ledger-card system will be easier than with any other system available to you. One by one, you can transfer your applications to the 2200VS:
• Take the crisis out of order entry and shipment, speed billings and improve cash-flow.
• Take the guesswork out of inventory control, get precise answers when you need them and become aware when stocks drop below critical levels.
• Take the surprise out of order flood or drought, obtain timely seasonal analyses and projections.
The 2200VS is the only system that can give you the benefit of a small to medium-scale computer that you and your people can use and that costs you less than traditional systems.
Relevant: For the large corporation. The large corporation's problem is to distribute computer power throughout its organization, into departments, divisions and subsidiaries, at headquarters and at remote locations, without incurring crippling costs in hardware, software generation and manpower.
The 2200VS, because of its user-oriented features, is particularly well suited for individual departmental needs, including engineering, research and operations research staffs, as well as remote plants and field sales organizations, environments with high expertise in operations management but limited knowhow in data processing techniques.
The 2200VS's modular design not only allows each remote location to configure a system to its specific needs, but most important, one set of application software can be used in different locations on different size configurations.
The payoff of distributed data processing is real. With the 2200VS you will get there sooner.
Powerful: Implementing virtual memory, a new technique for a system in this performance range, the Wang 2200VS easily outperforms systems in its price class. At the high end of its performance range, it competes with medium-scale computers at 25 percent of their cost.
Powerful: Virtual memory operating system dramatically reduces programming effort because there are no system-imposed restrictions.
Powerful: By virtue of its operating system, the Wang 2200VS gives each workstation user the equivalent of a one-million byte computer.
Powerful: You can mix COBOL, BASIC, RPG-II, ASSEMBLER programs for the most flexible implementation of your programming needs.
Powerful: The Wang 2200VS virtual memory system uses system resources more efficiently than other memory management systems.
Powerful: A sophisticated security system protects your files and programs.
Powerful: With up to 2.3 billion bytes of online storage, the Wang 2200VS can satisfy even the largest of data base requirements.
Powerful: The Wang 2200VS offers unique interactive programming and text editing, utilities and symbolic debug features.
Powerful: The Wang 2200VS is backed by a company with worldwide sales and service and a proven 25-year track record in the computer industry.
Powerful: Outstanding price/performance ratio. At the low end, a small 2200VS system with 64K bytes of memory and one or two workstations offers extraordinary processing clout and throughput.
At the high end, a 2200VS, built to full capacity, rivals any medium-scale mainframe at a quarter the price.
In addition, you save when your system must grow. Because there are no costly hardware swap-outs. Your 2200VS enjoys a smooth transition to a larger system simply through onsite hardware add-ons.
You save in staff salaries. Because your 2200VS can be run by your current office staff.
You save because its outstanding programming aids cut software development time. Your programmers are more productive and can put more jobs on the computer faster.
You save because all of the operating system software, the system utilities, the Assembler language and your choice of high-level program language are included in the basic system configuration price.
Powerful: The virtues of virtual memory. Unique for a system in its performance range, the 2200VS offers the advantages of virtual memory operating system.
The operating system, not the programmer, fits a program to the available memory. The programmer is, therefore, free to meet the needs of an application most effectively without regard for program size.
Also, you can use the same software in different locations on systems of different sizes thereby obviating the need to customize software for different volume requirements.
By the same token, system expansion is accomplished simply. Add memory, add disk storage or any other peripheral device. Again, existing software will function without change on your expanded configuration.
Of all operating systems available, virtual memory offers the best way towards performance improvements by adding memory without changes in existing software.
Powerful: The equivalent of a one-million-byte computer for each user. The 2200VS is designed for many users running different jobs simultaneously.
You enjoy access to the system at any time. There is no waiting in line behind other users. The system makes you feel as if it made all system resources exclusively available to you.
In fact, your and any other users' programs can be as large as one million bytes each.
Powerful: Most popular business languages, COBOL, BASIC, RPG-II, ASSEMBLER. The 2200VS offers the business world's most popular language in a standard form. ANSI '74 COBOL.
BASIC is available to provide powerful problem-solving capability. Many features have been added which are particularly useful in commercial applications.
RPG-II is a high-level programming language widely used in business data processing applications. Almost completely compatible with other RPG-II applications, the 2200VS RPG-II has been significantly enhanced to make it suitable for interactive applications.
The Assembler language provides the application programmer with access to the powerful general-purpose instruction set of the 2200VS. It contains most of the instructions available on the IBM 360/370 in IBM format. It includes a number of pre-defined macros and permits user definition of macroinstructions.
Powerful: Efficient use of system resources makes for outstanding performance. The 2200VS makes extremely efficient use of existing system resources, avoids program duplication and increases total performance:
• Users automatically share the same program in memory.
• Often parts of a program, even though necessary, are not used, or used only once, during a particular run. The 2200VS calls such parts of a program into memory only when they are actually being used.
• Data files can be shared by different users and accessed by different keys even with application software written in different languages.
Powerful: Sophisticated security system protects your files and programs. To preserve confidentiality, the 2200VS implements a sophisticated file protection and security system which you can tailor to suit the requirements of your specific applications. It allows you to place all your programs, procedures and data files in one of 28 file protection classes which are directly controlled by the security system administrators.
• For even greater performance, the 2200VS processor is complemented by independent Input/Output Processors. Each Input/Output Processor controls several peripheral devices. It handles all data transfers between them and memory, relieves the central processor of overseeing input/output operations and permits input/output processing to proceed concurrently with internal processing.
• For maximum use of peripheral resources, all print output is first saved on disk. When complete, it can be printed at high speed according to priorities you set.
Powerful: Extensive online file capability. The 2200VS can satisfy even very large online data base requirements. On the WCS/60 configurations, up to 150 megabytes of disk storage can be accessed. On the WCS/80 configurations, up to 2.3 billion bytes of online disk storage are available.
To conserve disk storage and increase overall system throughput, the 2200VS provides automatic data compaction removing all consecutively repeated characters from each record before storing it on disk and expanding it to its original format when read back.
Powerful: Interactive programming. Using the 2200VS's powerful programming aids, your staff will perform sophisticated operations on the system within minutes.
The symbolic debug facilities are completely interactive and allow the programmer to program and debug online using the system's screen. This means your programmers will write and implement new programs or make program changes with unheard-of ease and speed. The improvement in productivity is dramatic.
The 2200VS offers an impressive number of source file, object program and other utilities. File handling and file management are made easy through such important system functions as COPY, DISPLAY, PRINT, SORT, REPORT, DUMP, SECURITY and BACKUP.
A powerful system supported by a company with worldwide sales and service. The 2200VS is the latest in a series of Wang business computers that combine a unique price/performance ratio with ease and simplicity of use - features which put Wang computers squarely into the hands of the end user.
Using this approach, Wang has built a user base of some 20,000 business systems worldwide. Wang has offices in over 100 cities in North America, and an international sales organization in 60 countries. In all, Wang employs over 3200 people with 1800 in direct sales, systems and service support.
Wang continues to be listed among the top ten growth companies in the U.S., and its present growth rate is well ahead of that of the computer industry as a whole. In North America and in many parts of the world, Wang is as near as the telephone.
--- end most of the text in 2200VS_Brochure_Dec77.pdf ---
Note that "online disk storage" term or similar terms like "online storage", "online file" and "online data base" used above refers to (data in disks in) disk drives that are immediately accessible to programs for I/O. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_data_storage states, "For example, always-on spinning hard disk drives are online storage, while spinning drives that spin down automatically, such as in massive arrays of idle disks (MAID), are nearline storage. Removable media such as tape cartridges that can be automatically loaded, as in tape libraries, are nearline storage, while tape cartridges that must be manually loaded are offline storage."
Ravi: It is fascinating to see the emphasis this December 1977 brochure has on user-friendliness of Wang 2200VS computer and how that made it attractive to first-time computer users! As mentioned earlier, the first computer I ever touched (worked on) was the Wang VS 80 in mid 1984 or so, and while it was character user interface (not Graphical User Interface), it was quite user-friendly in that it was menu driven. In contrast, DOS on PCs which I later (I think sometime in 1985) got exposed to (that too was character interface and not GUI), was command based. The first UNIX system I got exposed to (around 1986/87 I think) was also character interface and command based. One had to know the commands by heart or have some manual on hand while operating the DOS PC or UNIX computer (without GUI) when one was not so familiar with it. The Wang VS 80 menu driven interface was far superior to DOS or UNIX (without GUI) command interface from a friendly to new user perspective. [I should also mention that in late 1987 or so I got my first exposure to UNIX based Graphical User Interface. I think it was on Sun workstations (using Sun's UNIX version probably Solaris and X-Windows/MOTIF as GUI). Of course, such GUI was far superior in user-friendliness to character user interfaces.]
Wang writes that sales of VS systems were slow initially. Note that above December 1977 2200VS brochure as well as April 1978 ComputerWorld advertisement of 2200VS does not mention word processing capability. As a later section will mention, addition of word processing to VS systems boosted its sales.
Computerworld 5th April 1982 article, on page 26, https://books.google.co.in/books?id=wGVWGF8phaUC&pg=PA26&lpg=PA26 , titled, "Furniture City Brings Its DP Problems Home" is about the city of Lenoir, North Carolina, USA adopting a financial management software system which ran on a Wang 2200VS computer, for meeting its data processing needs. The article states that Cogebec Information Inc. had an "integrated transaction-oriented financial management system" having general ledger, purchase order, accounts payable, accounts receivable, fixed asset inventory, payroll & personnel, tax billing and utility billing functionality that met the city's needs. It further states, "The hardware for the system utilized the Wang Laboratories, Inc. Wang 2200VS minicomputer with software from the vendor. It has 656K bytes of memory, 165M bytes of disk storage and six terminals, according to Wilson." Wilson was then the financial director of the city and the article conveys her satisfaction with the system. The 656K bytes of memory for Wang 2200VS may be a mistake - perhaps it is 256K bytes of memory, in which case the configuration indicates a Wang 2200VS WCS/60 system.
September 1978 2200VS BASIC Language Reference manual shows user-friendliness of 2200VS computer
https://www.wang2200.org/docs/language/2200VS_BasicLanguageRefV1.800-1202BA-01.1-79.pdf is the earliest VS related manual I was able to find on the Internet. It is the "2200VS BASIC Language Reference Manual (Release 1)" and (pdf) page 3 of the document mentions "Release: 1" and "September 1978" implying that the document was released on September 1978. On (pdf) page 9 it says, "VS BASIC is very similar to 2200 BASIC with the most important differences being in workstation and disk I/O."
On (pdf) page 12, it states, "Section 1.1 AN OVERVIEW: BASIC ON THE WANG 2200VS" followed by "Wang VS BASIC is a compiled, general-purpose, high-level programming language developed by Wang Laboratories for use on the VS System. This modified version of the original Dartmouth BASIC offers all the original language's important features, as well as added capabilities which suit it for both technical and commercial applications."
Given below are the text of part of (pdf) page 13 which continues on to (pdf) page 14:
The VS is an interactive system whose primary means of program and data entry is the interactive workstation terminal. Each workstation consists of a large, easy-to-read CRT screen used to display program messages, and a typewriter-like keyboard used to enter Operator commands and responses.
The programmer accustomed to batch-oriented systems will find that an interactive system such as the VS offers many conveniences. Programs can be entered, edited, compiled and run directly from the workstation keyboard, and results can be viewed at once on the CRT screen; the time-consuming intermediary steps of processing cards and printing out provisional results are completely eliminated. A complete set of system utilities also may be invoked directly from the workstation to perform common functions such as sorting, copying, and program linking. Finally, an extremely powerful interactive debugging facility is provided to enable run-time debugging of a program from the workstation. This debug facility also permits the programmer to examine and modify data values by referencing their symbolic data-names; it is not necessary to specify their absolute addresses in memory. All of these features are fully documented in the 2200VS Programmer's Introduction.
For the program user, too, the interactive workstation is a distinct convenience. User instructions are displayed on the workstation screen in a clear, readable format. Data is entered from the keyboard and immediately validated; if correction is required, an appropriate message is displayed, and the data can be reentered correctly. The user can also interact with the BASIC program by selecting run-time options and supplying device and file information.
[(pdf) page 14 contents:]
In summary, the interactive workstation provides a powerful and useful tool for the programmer and the program user alike. It enables the programmer to develop interactive programs which provide the user with far more control over program options and processing flow than was feasible in traditional, card-oriented systems. Because programs are entered, compiled, and debugged at the workstation, and because data validation and correction are performed automatically as data is entered, the tasks of program development and data entry are greatly facilitated on the VS.
1.2 HARDWARE CONFIGURATION
The Wang VS is an interactive, disk-based computer which supports multiple, concurrent tasks from interactive workstation terminals, and provides an efficient virtual memory addressing capability. The system is available with a variety of disk units, ranging from small, flexible diskette drives through medium-scale, fixed/removable disk drives, up to large-capacity, high-performance, multi-platter disk units. Industry-compatible, nine-track magnetic tape drives also are supported. For hardcopy output, a variety of printers, ranging from character matrix printers to high-speed line printers are available. The primary device for programmer and program user communication with the VS system is the workstation, which is an interactive terminal consisting of a keyboard and a CRT display with 24 lines of 80 characters each.
1.3 ENTERING AND COMPILING A BASIC PROGRAM ON THE VS
The process of creating and running a BASIC program on the VS consists of three steps:
- The BASIC source text is entered at the workstation using the VS source text EDITOR.
- The source program is compiled into an object program using the VS BASIC compiler.
- The object program is run.
These three steps can be accomplished by means of the Command Processor; this sequence is fully documented in Chapter 3 of the 2200VS Programmer's Introduction and summarized briefly in this section and the next. The entire sequence can also be accomplished by EZBASIC and the EDITOR, system utilities designed to provide integrated programming environments within which the processes of creating, editing, compiling and running program files can be carried out easily and efficiently. EZBASIC and the EDITOR are fully documented in Chapter 6 of the 2200VS Programmer's Introduction and summarized below in the next few pages.
--- end (pdf) page 14 contents of 2200VS BASIC manual ---
The above extracts give us a good idea of how user-friendly the Wang 2200VS computer to the BASIC programmer as well as the program user. As Wang 2200VS also supported COBOL (and RPGII) high-level language(s), it would have been similarly user-friendly to the COBOL programmer. Note that the manual date is September 1978.
Ravi: I was around 16 years old then (Sep. 1978) and had just entered junior college in Bombay/Mumbai. I am typing this in October 2021 which is 43 years after this manual was published! I am so glad that I am able to put up this post which documents clearly that Wang Laboratories produced a great and affordable minicomputer way back in 1977/78 suitable for business data processing needs of medium scale companies (and departments of large companies too), which was user friendly to both programmers and users, even though it was a character based workstation interface (NOT Graphical User Interface).
Note that the 2200VS is many times referred to simply as the VS in the above mentioned Wang BASIC manual.
Wang VS 80
As mentioned earlier, the 2200VS WCS/60 and WCS/80 were the first Wang Virtual Storage computers, and were introduced in 1977. Shortly thereafter Wang VS 80 was introduced with a higher capacity of max. workstations of 32 as compared to 23 of WCS/80. There seems to be some jargon confusion in late 1970s advertisements and articles about 2200VS and VS 80 computer models, with VS being used to refer to both. But in later years the 2200VS name seems to have been withdrawn and Wang VS 80 was viewed as the low end computer of the Wang VS computer line.
Computer World magazine issue of 27th July 1981 carries an article on Wang VS 80 (VS80) with article title as "Trust Firm Streamlines Services with Supermini, Improves Productivity" on pages 31 and 34: https://books.google.co.in/books?id=HFeWMc0WnfoC&pg=RA1-PA34&lpg=RA1-PA34&dq=wang+VS80+COMPUTER&source=bl&ots=P9tbiKPp9_&sig=ACfU3U1CMU8rlBLGJbtar-gZ8Ue_pcweXQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjisvLlkJ_zAhWyzjgGHTOwApM4ChDoAXoECCQQAw#v=onepage&q&f=false .
Given below is a pic from above article. Note that the caption within the pic has been added by me.
The company covered in above ComputerWorld article was into detailed property management, estate planning, managing customer investments, providing tax information etc. and also as a service bureau for "financial institutions too small to justify the cost of a computer system". The article describes how this company which had to upgrade its earlier computer system, chose Wang VS 80. Over a few months they explored options from various computer companies including Burroughs, IBM, Sperry Univac and Wang Labs.
The article states, "The company finally settled on a Wang VS80 computer system, both because the system could be easily upgraded to meet future needs and its operating system was compatible among many Wang models".
It goes on to state, "Installed in January 1980, the system has 512K bytes of main memory, four disk drives, totaling 1G byte of storage, and two 75-in./sec tape transports. Peripherals include five Wang video terminals in (company-name) accounting department, 10 in the computer center and 10 in other departments including remote terminals in the firm's Hilo office."
I think the above description is a typical Wang VS 80 installation in the 1980s for an accounting services and computer service center customer company. I thank Computer World magazine for above pic and few extracts being used in this free article, and presume that they have no objections to me sharing above pic and few extracts. I also thank Computer World for contributing to written history of Wang VS 80 computer, available free on the Internet.
Addition of word processing to VS line of computers, boosted VS sales
Wang writes that sales for VS was slow initially. In response to customer requests, word processing functionality was added to VS which resulted in VS sales "tak(ing) off".
Wang writes, "By adding word processing to the VS, we enabled customers to integrate data processing and word processing. A year or so later, we added telecommunications, which enabled us to network a company's VSs and their mainframe computers."
There was concern that adding word processing to VS might kill OIS. Wang Labs. built a bridge between OIS, VS and 2200 computers. This resulted in both VS and OIS sales "soaring".
Details about Wang 2200VS initial models being the WCS/60 and WCS/80 which were slightly different from Wang VS 80
Note: This indented sub-section goes into a lot of details. Only readers who are keenly interested in this aspect of Wang VS computer history may want to read it. Other readers may feel free to skip this indented sub-section.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories#The_Wang_VS_computer_line does not provide the model name for the first Wang VS computers. https://tjunker.com/about/the-vs/whats-a-wang-vs/ seems to be a noted page and website for info. on Wang VS computers. In the section, "The VS in a nutshell" in above webpage, it states, "The VS is a line of small mainframe computers designed and manufactured by Wang Laboratories, Inc. The first, the VS80, was released in 1977, and was rated to serve up to 32 users." Note that this webpage's view that the VS was a line of mainframe computers contrasts with media reports as well as Wang Labs. themselves referring to almost all VS computers typically as minicomputers (with the exception of VS 300). The website does provide some arguments for why it views Wang VS family as mainframe computers and not minicomputers. There is a possibility that Wang Laboratories chose to avoid using the mainframe term for its computers, for marketing reasons.
My search on the Internet for early Wang VS models led me to Wang brochures and Wang articles & advertisements in Computerworld, some of which are shared above in this post. They mention Wang 2200VS (processor) with models WCS/60 and WCS/80 as the new Virtual Storage (Virtual Memory) computer line introduced by Wang Laboratories in 1977.
I then wondered whether the high end model of this Wang 2200VS line i.e WCS/80 was simply renamed as Wang VS 80 later on.
But there were two issues that did not fit this scenario. One was that WCS/80 the high end model of Wang 2200VS supported a max. of 23 workstations whereas the Wang VS 80 supported a max. of 32 workstations. The other was that there is no mention of word processing feature in Wang 2200VS computer models (WCS/60 & WCS/80) but Wang VS 80 is said to have ability for word processing (provided the system has enough RAM as word processing needs a sizeable chunk of RAM).
As mentioned earlier, my view now is that Wang VS 80 is a slightly enhanced machine from the Wang 2200VS WCS/80. Perhaps the addition of word processing to Wang VS 80 did not involve any hardware upgradation and so the basic Wang VS 80 computer remained unchanged hardware-wise.
I tried hard to dig up some announcement of introduction of Wang VS 80 in Computerworld magazines on Google Books and also on the Internet in general using Google search, but did not succeed in getting any such article.
After digging up quite some info. on the matter, it seems to me that Wang 2200VS, shortly after its announcement began to be referred to as Wang VS or Wang 2200VS (both terms being used). Six months to a year after Wang2200VS was introduced, Wang Labs. seems to have entirely dropped using 2200, and started using only Wang VS as the name of the system. Also there had been some capability improvement (e.g. 32 workstations support from 23) over these months. So the Wang VS computer mentioned in early 1979 in Wang advertisement and articles about it, seems to have been the later model supporting 32 workstations. This early 1979 Wang VS computer (which possibly was available from sometime in 1978 itself), was in later years referred to as Wang VS 80 (after newer Wang VS models like VS 100, VS 90, VS 45 etc. had been introduced). On the Internet, some websites on Wang VS history state that Wang VS 80 was the first Wang VS computer which was introduced in (late) 1977. However, the data that I have dug up indicates that Wang 2200VS WCS 60 & WCS 80 computer models were the first Wang VS computers announced (introduced) in October 1977 with availability from (as announced) December 1977. The Wang VS 80 seems to have been part of this computer product line but had some enhancements like max. 32 workstations support, and this Wang VS (80) computer was available, for sure in early 1979, and most probably first announced and/or made available sometime in 1978. My guess is that Wang VS 80 computer, then called just Wang VS computer, became available at some point from June to December 1978.
I should also mention that I recall that in 1984 when I first worked (as an applications programmer) on the Wang VS 80 (in Bombay, India), it was referred to as Wang VS 80 and not as Wang VS or "original" Wang VS. Of course, at that time, I had no idea about the history of Wang VS computers and I don't think I heard the 2200VS term at all [I did hear about Wang 2200 systems but as a separate line of Wang computers to that of the VS family. I have never worked on a Wang 2200 system, as far as I can recall.]
Wang Systems Newsletter No. 8, April, 1978, https://wang2200.org/docs/newsletter/WangSystemsNewsletter_8.700-3137A.4-78.pdf mentions on page 3 about "a new low-end member of the 2200VS family" WCS-50 with 2200VS-2B CPU and 64KB memory (max. memory 192KB). In the same page there is another article which states, "Wang Laboratories recently arranged to have General Accounting applications developed for the new 2200VS." So I think we can presume that in April 1978, the Wang 2200VS system was still being referred to in official & public Wang systems documentation as Wang 2200VS and NOT as Wang VS. Further the WCS term was being used in this context.
Computerworld 15 May 1978, page 91, https://books.google.co.in/books?id=ycJb-Oo9BoIC&pg=PA91&lpg=PA91 , has a Wang Labs. advertisement for "Software Technical Writers" position. The advertisement states, "WANG is looking for software technical writers to document our new state-of-the-art 2200VS computer system." That tells us that even in May 1978, Wang company, in public, continued to use 2200VS and not plain (Wang) VS as the computer name for this system.
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=1647091 has some part of IEEE Computer magazine August 1978 issue which carries a short 2 paragraph article on Wang 2200VS-B computer system on page 80. The article is titled 'Wang combats "non-expandable" computers'. The first paragraph contents are: "The 2200VS-B virtual memory computer can grow from a $40,000 to a $500,000 system without replacing any hardware and without changing a single line of application code, according to its manufacturer, Wang Laboratories, Inc. Similarly, this general-purpose business computer system can grow from a two-workstation, 10 M-byte storage configuration to a 19 workstation, 2.3-billion-byte storage configuration without hardware replacement or reprogramming. The net result, Wang claims, is that investment in hardware and software is totally protected."
Ravi: It is very interesting to see IEEE Computer magazine carry the above paragraph.
The second paragraph gives details of the 2200VS-B:
- $38,000 price (start configuration, I guess)
- 64K memory expandable to 192K
- 1 diskette drive
- 10 M bytes disk drive expandable to 150M
- virtual operating system
- BASIC, COBOL, RPGII and Assembler language support
- 1 workstation with capacity to add 10 more workstations
- variety of peripherals including 7 different printers and 9- track tape drives
- 9600 baud telecommunications
Note that the system name no longer has WCS in it, and instead the name is 2200VS-B which seems to correspond to the WCS/60 configuration. Perhaps then there was a 2200VS-A which corresponded to WCS/80 configuration.
Wang Systems Newsletter No. 11, January, 1979, https://wang2200.org/docs/newsletter/WangSystemsNewsletter_11.700-3137K.1-79.pdf has many references to Wang VS systems (without 2200 in the name) along with a few references to Wang 2200VS. That gives me the impression that around January 1979, Wang Labs. was starting to use 'Wang VS' to refer to its "Wang 2200VS" computer line. For example, the first page (cover page) main article is titled, "Software house expands market - adds VS". The article then mentions 2200VS announcement and a "special VS seminar" in Los Angeles to which this software house, which was in Wang software consultancy from 1975, was invited. The comments from a person of this software house use the term VS and NOT 2200VS - "I spent one day there, saw the machine, and just sat in awe." and "I didn't think that Wang would get to the level of the VS - at least not that fast. The VS is more than an engineering achievement - it is a software achievement."
Page 2 of the newsletter has an article titled, "General Accounting Applications on the VS" which only uses the term VS and not 2200VS. However Page 15 has a list titled "2200VS Manuals and Miscellaneous Material" where almost all the around 20 odd manuals listed use the term 2200VS. E.g. "2200VS Assembler Language Reference Manual" and "2200VS Programmer's Introduction".
I did not catch any mention of WCS in context of 2200VS in the above newsletter.
Wang Systems Newsletter No. 12, March, 1979, https://wang2200.org/docs/newsletter/WangSystemsNewsletter_12.700-3137L.3-79.pdf , mentions only VS and 2200VS. Further it says that the VS supports 32 workstations! I have given the related text below.
[From page 5 and later pages:]
VS Remote Work Stations
This release announces the availability of Remote Work Station support on the VS System. The addition of this feature to the VS product line provides a telecommunications based facility by which devices, physically remote from the VS, can access the VS. Remote Work Stations have been implemented in such a manner that these devices appear to the VS as if they were local devices. However, there are certain ground rules which must be followed when including remote Work Stations in a VS Configuration.
...
A maximum of 32 work stations are supported on a single VS system. Of these 32 work stations, one must be designated as the systems console which is locally attached to the VS, while the other 31 may be any combination of local or remote work stations.
...
Remote Work Stations look like local Work Stations to VS application programs. Consequently, remote Work Stations perform identical functions to that of local Work Stations but at a slower speed due to the delays associated with communications lines.
---- end text extracts from March 1979 newsletter ---So the Wang VS (later called VS 80) with support for 32 workstations (as against 23 for 2200VS WCS/80) was available in or before March 1979 (probably before as the 32 workstations support is not announced as a new feature).Page 9 of the above newsletter lists some publications with some manuals having 2200VS in its title (e.g. "2200VS User Aids Reference Manual" and some having only VS (e.g. "VS Language Data Sheet").Computerworld,11 Jun. 1979, page 6, https://books.google.co.in/books?id=DaQm_hqLCBQC&pg=PA6&lpg=PA6 , has an article on Wang VS 100 announcement but with a question about it, as first deliveries would be only in July 1980! The article makes references to current VS (Wang VS).Wang Systems Newsletter No. 14, July, 1979, https://wang2200.org/docs/newsletter/WangSystemsNewsletter_14.700-3137N.8-79.pdf , page 13 has a description of VS-100.Computerworld issue of July 27, 1981, page 34, https://books.google.co.in/books?id=HFeWMc0WnfoC&pg=RA1-PA34&lpg=RA1-PA34 , has an article (continuation) titled "Supermini Helps Firm Streamline Services" which states, "The company finally settled on a Wang VS80 computer system ..." followed by "Installed in January 1980, the system has 512K bytes of main memory, four disk drives, totaling 1G byte of storage, and two 75-in./sec tape transports. Peripherals include five Wang video terminals in Bishop Trust's accounting department, 10 in the computer center and 10 in other departments including remote terminals in the firm's Hilo office."
From the above text of the article, we can conclude that Wang VS 80 system was available in January 1980 if not earlier but perhaps was known by some other name at that time (Wang VS?). But by July 1981 this system was being referred to as Wang VS 80 (or Wang VS80) in the computer news media. Further, this system installation in January 1980 is reported to have 25 video terminals (workstations) connected to the Wang VS 80 computer. Note that Wang 2200VS WCS/80 (largest configuration) could support max. 23 workstations as per Dec. 1977 brochure. So the system reported in this article was NOT Wang 2200VS WCS/80 but a different and slightly more powerful Wang VS 80.
Computerworld Sept. 13, 1982, page 51, https://books.google.co.in/books?id=69kEbmHHmggC&pg=PA51&lpg=PA51 , has a full page advertisement of Wang Labs. titled, "Buy any Wang VS computer and get an office automation system free". The systems advertised are: Wang VS 100, Wang VS 90, Wang VS 45, Wang VS 25 and Wang VS 80.
From the above, we can conclude the following:
- First Wang VS systems (with Virtual Storage/Virtual Memory feature) were Wang 2200VS WCS/60 and Wang 2200VS WCS/80 introduced in October 1977 with announced availability from December 1977
- Wang VS 80 (then named only as Wang VS) came along later even if it may have been only slightly improved version of Wang 2200VS WCS/80, with VS 80 supporting a max. of 32 workstations whereas 2200VS WCS/80 could support max. of 23 workstations.
- Wang VS 80 seems to have initially been named as Wang VS (without 80).
- Wang VS 100 was announced in June 1979 at which time Wang VS 80 but without 80 in its name then, was already available. Note that even though VS 100 was announced in June 1979, first deliveries of it were scheduled only for July 1980, a year later.
- When exactly Wang VS 80 (with name of Wang VS) was introduced is not known to me, as of now, but it probably was in 1978/79 (in or before March 1979 for sure).
- In or before July 1981, the former Wang VS computer was referred to as Wang VS 80.
- In or before Sept. 1982, Wang Labs. was advertising in computer news media (e.g. Computerworld magazine) about 5 different Wang VS computer systems - Wang VS 100, Wang VS 90, Wang VS 45, Wang VS 25 and Wang VS 80.
Wang writes, "we made it very easy for a customer to upgrade from a simple word processing system to OIS". Wang also states that some limited programming and data processing features were added to OIS later on.
When was Wang OIS introduced?
The above wiki page section, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories#Wang_OIS , also tells us: "The word processing machine – the Wang 1200 WPS – was introduced in June 1976 and was an instant success, as was its successor, the 1977 Wang OIS[17] (Office Information System)." [Ref. 17: "Wang-Computers1", http://community.fortunecity.ws/roswell/goldendawn/232/WangComputers1.htm . Community.fortunecity.ws. Retrieved 2016-05-20.]
http://www.wang1200.org/history.html also tells us, "The single WPS system quickly evolved into a more general family in 1977, the Wang Office Information System, or OIS for short. OIS had even more capable word processing capabilities, a general programming language for more technically adept customers, and greater networking options."
I have not been able to get confirmation that OIS was introduced in 1977 through something like a Computerworld article or advertisement. The earliest Computerworld reference to Wang OIS that I got was this 11th June 1979 issue on page 6: https://books.google.co.in/books?id=DaQm_hqLCBQC&pg=PA6&lpg=PA6 . It carries articles on announcements of VS-100, two new OIS models, support for BASIC language option in OIS systems (OIS/BASIC) that would enable some data processing functions besides OIS's word processing functions, and some other products like printer(s). It mentions OIS/145 as one of the new systems and in that context it mentions, "the OIS/140 Wang introduced last December". So we can confirm that OIS/140 was introduced in December 1978. But OIS/130 seems to have been an earlier model. I was not able to get clear data for when it was introduced.
Wang VS computers after VS-80; Associated Wang VS software
The "table of VS Models" https://tjunker.com/about/the-vs/vs-models/ gives a comprehensive list of VS models with their year of introduction. In this section, I am covering only the models till mid 1980s as I had heard about most of them, and used a few of them.
After Wang VS 80 with max. users (workstations) being 32 and introduced in 1977, Wang VS 100 seems to be the next major VS computer model, introduced in 1979 with max. users being 128. If I recall correctly, in one of my assignments at Wang Labs. Lowell in second half of 1980s, I used a Wang VS 100.
Wang VS 90 was introduced in 1980 which seems to have been in between VS 80 and VS 100 in performance (and, most probably, in price as well). If I recall correctly, some customer(s) of Datamatics in Mumbai (where I was employed) used Wang VS 90.
VS 85 (max. users: 80) was introduced in 1983. I think I have heard of this model being used by some Wang customers during my assignment stints or while I was doing Datamatics work in Mumbai.
VS 15, VS 25 and VS 45 were introduced in 1984 and had max. users of only 16. I don't recall hearing much about these models in the period I used Wang VS (mainly second half of 1980s).
The advertisement whose pics are given below appeared in ComputerWorld issue of 13th Sept. 1982, page 51 - https://books.google.co.in/books?id=69kEbmHHmggC&pg=PA51&lpg=PA51 . The first pic is the whole advertisement followed by another pic focusing on detailed content of it.
The advertisement shows pictures of Wang VS 100, Wang VS 45, Wang VS 90, Wang VS 25 and Wang VS 80.
The key text in the advertisement is as follows:
When you buy any Wang VS (Virtual Storage) computer, you're not just buying another computer. You're buying a flexible, powerful, computer system that's compatible with most mainframes and offers a range of multi-functional capabilities no one else can touch.
Along with Data Processing and electronic mail, you get Wang Word Processing, the world's standard. And when you consider that 80% of the information handled in most offices is in written form, that's no small extra.
But more than that, you get the only computer system that has the built-in capability to automate your entire office. A system that's expandable, upgradable and compatible from low to high end. And because all VS systems run under one operating system and support the same software, it's the world's easiest system to learn and to use.
The Wang VS. When you consider all you get, and what you get it for, why consider anything else?
---- end key text in advertisement ----
Wang VS 100 seems to have been the top-end Wang VS computer in the early to mid 1980s. Computerworld issue of 11th June 1979 has an article about its introduction titled, "Wang Planning to Unwrap CPU in 4341 Range" on page 6, https://books.google.co.in/books?id=DaQm_hqLCBQC&pg=PA6&lpg=PA6 . The article states that the 32-bit VS 100 is claimed to be "more powerful and less expensive than IBM's 4341", and that while delivery of the system will be only in 1980, Wang Labs. was "dead serious" about taking orders for it "right now".
Computerworld issue of 18 Jun. 1979, https://books.google.co.in/books?id=rfsvbXyn0ZEC&pg=PA23 , carries a Wang Labs. advertisement comparing VS100 vs. some IBM models. Given below are a pic of the full advertisement followed by a pic of the key part of it.
A Wang VS 100 computer is available at a computer museum: https://www.ricomputermuseum.org/collections-gallery/equipment/wang-vs100 . The link has pics of the VS 100 and the following text: "The VS100 uses the CP4 processor and was introduced in 1979. It has 32 bit system bus, a 64 bit memory bus and a 16 bit I/O bus. This system has dual I/O buses. The VS90 looks the same as this system but has a single I/O bus".
An interesting brochure about Wang computer models in early 1980s is Wang Computer Systems VS Processors, September 1982 - http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/brochures/VS_Processor_Brochure_Sep82.pdf. It gives details of Wang VS systems like Wang VS 100, Wang VS 50 and Wang VS (which I think refers to Wang VS 80) in a relatively small 9 page document.
The big thing for me in my Wang VS usage days was Wang VS software. I think all the VS systems mentioned above ran all Wang VS software available then though some lower capability VS models may have had poor performance issues for some Wang VS software. I do not recall any compatibility issues across VS systems then, for well known (among customers & users) Wang VS software. If one learned and acquired expertise in providing solutions using one set of Wang VS software on one Wang VS computer model, that knowledge could be used to provide similar solutions on other Wang VS models. So for us software solutions on Wang VS platform guys, we were quite independent of underlying Wang VS computer model hardware. We had to focus on acquiring expertise in some Wang VS software and then provide that expertise to customers (who had or were ready to buy Wang VS computers).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories#Software gives a good description of Wang VS software. I have provided its text below:
The VS operating system and all system software were built from the ground up to support interactive users as well as batch operations. The VS was aimed directly at the business data processing market in general, and IBM in particular. While many programming languages were available, the VS was typically programmed in COBOL. Other languages supported in the VS integrated development environment included Assembler, COBOL 74, COBOL 85, BASIC, Ada, RPG II, C, PL/I, FORTRAN, Glossary, MABASIC, SPEED II, and Procedure (a scripting language). Pascal was also supported for I/O co-processor development. The Wang PACE (Professional Application Creation Environment) 4GL and database was used from the mid-1980s onward by customers and third-party developers to build complex applications sometimes involving many thousands of screens, hundreds of distinct application modules, and serving many hundreds of users. Substantial vertical applications were developed for the Wang VS by third-party software houses throughout the 1980s in COBOL, PACE, BASIC, PL/I and RPG II. The Wang OFFICE family of applications and Wang WP were both popular applications on the VS. Word Processing ran on the VS through services that emulated the OIS environment and downloaded the WP software as "microcode" (in Wang terminology) to VS workstations.
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On the Wang VS, I have programmed in Assembler, COBOL, BASIC, 'C', PL/1 and Procedure. I did not use PACE. So I had no exposure to any database software on Wang VS with my application programming work only using Indexed and Sequential files provided by Wang VS Operating System.
http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/ has a list of Wang VS manuals. As I got into software development field after dropping out of my M.Sc. Physics (masters degree), I did not have much knowledge of computer operation and software development. The initial training program at my first company, Datamatics Consultants in Mumbai, was quite good but that training was focused on teaching COBOL programming and some exposure to Systems Analysis. There was also a later short training program on Assembly language programming and associated Wang VS computer principles and concepts. But it is Wang VS manuals on topics like Principles of Operation and Operating System Services that taught me a lot about computer architecture and Operating System details of Wang VS, along with manuals like Wang VS Assembler manual. I am indebted to the writers of these manuals as they were the primary source of my learning about these topics.
The above link having a list of Wang VS manuals that can be downloaded is a great treasure for those interested in Wang VS history. I was thrilled that I could download some of the manuals I mentioned above. Going through these manuals gives a very good idea of the sophistication level of Wang VS platform. I have given below some of these manual links (from above link which has a list of links for many manuals):
* Wang VS Principles of Operation, Release 7 Series, 1st edition - February 1986, http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/715-0422_VS_Principles_Of_Operation_V7_Feb86.pdf (Has computer architecture, instruction set etc.)
* Wang VS Operating System Services Reference, Release 7, Controlled Release Draft - October 1985, http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/715-0423_VS_Operating_System_Services_Release_7_Series_Oct85.pdf (Covers OS services like program initiation & termination, I/O services, memory management including allocation of heap memory, communication services, File services, Security services etc. and how they can be called from programs etc.)
* Wang VS Assembly Language Reference, 3rd edition, Aug. 1982, http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/800-1200AS-03_VS_Assembly_Language_Aug82.pdf
* Wang VS Programmer's Introduction, 6th edition, Aug 1983, http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/800-1101-06_VS_Programmers_Introduction_Aug83.pdf (Has got top-level view of how to use Wang VS for programming work; Has screen diagrams which give a good idea of how one interacted with Wang VS on a workstation to do programming work; Has to be used along with a few other manuals like Program Development Tools manual to get full view of programming on Wang VS)
* Wang VS Program Development Tools Reference, 3rd edition, Aug. 1983, http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/800-1307-03_VS_Program_Development_Tools_Aug83.pdf (Covers editing, compiling, linking and debugging; Wang VS had a great symbolic debugger where one could inspect and modify data variables by name, set traps etc.)
* Wang VS Data Management System Reference, 1st edition, January 1984, http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/800-1124-01_VS_Data_Management_System_Reference_Jan84.pdf (Covers the data file types of Wang VS - Sequential files, Indexed files, Alternated Indexed files etc. and ways in which to access records in them (read them), modify and delete records in them)
* Wang VS COBOL Reference, 6th edition, February 1984, http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/800-1201-06_VS_COBOL_Reference_Feb82.pdf (Has most if not all the stuff needed by Wang VS COBOL programmers to write programs on Wang VS - accessing files, screen (for interactive programs), writing print files, tape file I/O, Sort-merge etc.)
* Wang VS BASIC Language Reference, 5th edition, Sept. 1986, http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/wang/vs/800-1202E_VS_BASIC_Language_Reference_Sep86.pdf
Decline and fall of Wang Labs.; An Wang passing away in 1990 at age 70
Given below are some extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories :
At its peak in the 1980s, Wang Laboratories had annual revenues of $3 billion and employed over 33,000 people.
...
Wang Laboratories filed for bankruptcy protection in August 1992.[5: Adam Bryant (August 19, 1992). "Wang Files for Bankruptcy; 5,000 Jobs to Be Cut". New York Times. Retrieved August 20, 2014.] After emerging from bankruptcy, the company eventually changed its name to Wang Global. Wang Global was acquired by Getronics of the Netherlands in 1999, becoming Getronics North America, then was sold to KPN in 2007 and CompuCom in 2008, after which it no longer existed as a distinct brand or division.
...
A common view within the PC community is that Wang Labs failed because it specialized in computers designed specifically for word processing and did not foresee (and was unable to compete against) general-purpose personal computers with word processing software in the 1980s. Word processing was not actually the mainstay of Wang's business by the time desktop computers began to gain in popularity. Although Wang manufactured desktops, its main business by the 1980s, was its VS line of mini-computer and "midframe" systems. The market for these minicomputers was ultimately conquered by enhanced micro-computers like the Apple Macintosh and the "Wintel" PC on one end and Sun, IBM and Hewlett-Packard servers on the other end.
An Wang's insistence that his son, Fred Wang, succeed him contributed to the company's failure. Fred Wang was a business school graduate, "but by almost any definition", wrote Charles C. Kenney, "unsuited for the job in which his father had placed him." His assignment, first as head of research and development, then as president of the company, led to resignations by key R&D and business personnel. Amid declining revenues, John F. Cunningham, an 18-year employee of the firm, resigned as president and COO of Wang Labs to become chairman and chief executive of Computer Consoles Inc. Cunningham resigned due to disagreement with An Wang on how to pull the company out of the slump, as well as being upset that Fred Wang was positioned as the successor, an instance of nepotism.[57: Day, Kathleen (1985-07-20). "Cunningham Resigns as Wang President". Los Angeles Times.][58: "History of WANG LABORATORIES, INC. – FundingUniverse". Fundinguniverse.com. Retrieved 2016-05-20.]
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In the Lessons book which seems to have been first published in 1986, Wang writes, "Wang Laboratories today [Ravi: 1986, I presume] has the momentum of a three-billion-dollar enterprise that employs thirty thousand people."
Wang writes, "The (computer) industry as a whole suffered a retrenchment in 1985, an event so serious that it affected companies that had proven almost impregnable to previous setbacks. Wang Laboratories was among this group of companies." Wang Labs. had a loss in the fourth quarter of 1985 which was its first loss in ten years, and only its second loss in company history.
Wang writes that in 1985 the company increases its expenses by 22%, in anticipation of sales growth from $2.2 billion to about $3 billion in FY 1985. But sales actually grew only to $2.4 billion, an increase of 8.6%. Wang Labs. had to layoff employees - its first layoff in ten years.
WANG LABS' CRITICAL JUNCTURE, https://www.nytimes.com/1986/12/11/business/wang-labs-critical-juncture.html , dated Dec. 11th 1986, is an interesting article. Some extracts from it :
Until 1985, when the entire computer industry fell into a slump, Wang had been one of its stars. With a string of highly successful calculators and word-processing systems developed by An Wang, the company became an almost ubiquitous presence in the American office, selling its goods to more than 80 percent of the nation's 2,000 largest companies.
But now, as it realigns its management, Wang is also struggling to reignite growth by concentrating its efforts on minicomputers, the machines used to expand and tie together large computer networks.
Facing Direct Competition
Unlike the word-processing systems that fueled Wang's growth during the 1970's, minicomputers put the company in direct competition with I.B.M., the Digital Equipment Corporation and other industry giants at a time that the industry is continuing to contract. So far, Wang has captured only a 3 percent share of the market, according to the International Data Corporation, a Framingham, Mass., research firm.
...
One problem facing the junior Mr. Wang [Ravi: Fred Wang] results from a series of delays that have plagued its top-of-the-line minicomputer, the VS-300. Introduced in 1983 as one of several new Wang computers, the machine had software problems that put off many potential customers.
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Another relevant article which seems to have been written in or around 1992: Wang Laboratories, Inc., https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/economics-business-and-labor/businesses-and-occupations/wang-laboratories-inc . A few extracts from it:
Between 1979 and 1984 Wang’s revenues skyrocketed 61 percent annually. Meanwhile, the company made a further commitment to the development of word processing and data processing products, increasing its research and development budget from $3 million in 1976 to $160 million in 1984. During this growth surge, Wang also broke into the Fortune 500 market, and by 1983 nearly half of company revenues were generated by Fortune 500 customers.
...
Ten years after Wang left calculators for computers, a computer-market recession hit, sending profit margins into a nose dive. After reaching $1 billion in sales in 1982, and $2 billion in sales in 1984, sales plummeted in the third quarter of 1985, with Wang posting its first decline in ten years. Wang responded to a net income falloff of 66 percent by announcing a layoff of 1,600 (five percent) of its workers, and pay cuts for executives.
Wang’s attempts to penetrate IBM’s market in the 1980s often resulted in costly setbacks. Critics suggested that Wang had been too slow to respond to the growth of personal computers, clinging to its once-heralded minicomputers of the late 1970s, which by the late 1980s were being pushed aside by the smaller and sometimes more powerful personal computers.
--- end extracts from encyclopedia.com ----
Death of An Wang
An Wang died in March 1990. While for some years in the 1980s, An Wang had handed over role of President to John F. Cunningham from 1983 to July 1985, later to An Wang's son Fred Wang from end 1986 to Aug. 1989, and finally to Richard Miller. But An Wang continued to play a top-level leadership role in Wang Labs. even during these periods (perhaps with official position of Chairman).
New York Times obituary: An Wang, 70, Is Dead of Cancer; Inventor and Maker of Computers, https://www.nytimes.com/1990/03/25/obituaries/an-wang-70-is-dead-of-cancer-inventor-and-maker-of-computers.html , 25th March 1990. Given below are some small extracts from it:
Dr. Wang, the holder of 40 patents and 23 honorary degrees, built up Wang Laboratories from a one-man electrical fixtures store on top of a Boston garage into one of the world's major computer manufacturers. The initial investment was $600.
...
He was one of only 69 members of the National Inventors Hall of Fame. ''One of the pioneering giants of the computer industry has left us,'' said Richard W. Miller, the company's president. ''Dr. Wang's legacy is a life distinguished both as inventor and entrepreneur and as a good and decent man.''
...
Wang Laboratories, in Lowell, Mass., was vital to the ''Massachusetts Miracle'' of the early 1980's, when high-technology industries brought new life to the state's aging factory towns.
''I don't know how many countless thousands of thousands of people owe a debt of gratitude for what he did,'' Gov. Michael S. Dukakis [Ravi: Governor of Massachusetts from 1975 to 1979 and from 1983 to 1991, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Dukakis ], once said of Dr. Wang.
--- end extracts from New York Times ---
An Wang contributed a lot to society in general. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Wang#Later_years
An Wang also founded the Wang Institute of Graduate Studies in Tyngsborough, Massachusetts, which offered a graduate program in software engineering. He made substantial donations to this organization, including the proceeds of his autobiography, Lessons. However, enrollment remained low, and in 1987, after nearly a decade of operation, Wang decided to discontinue funding the institution and transferred ownership of the campus to Boston University.
An Wang also made a substantial contribution for the restoration of a Boston landmark, which was then called the Metropolitan Theatre. The "Met" was renamed in 1983 as The Wang Theatre, and the Metropolitan Center became known as the Wang Center for the Performing Arts. Wang donated $4 million to Massachusetts General Hospital's ambulatory care center, which was renamed to the Wang Building. [4: "Wang Building". Archived from the original on 2015-01-28.]
Wang was one of twelve recipients of the Medal of Liberty in 1986. He was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 1988.[5: "Inventor profile - An Wang". National Inventors Hall of Fame. Archived from the original on 2010-12-05. Retrieved January 15, 2011.] The An Wang Middle School in Lowell, Massachusetts, is named in his honor, as is the An Wang Professorship of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Harvard University, held by Roger W. Brockett and Hanspeter Pfister, the An Wang Professorship of Computer Science at Brown University, held by John E. Savage, and the Wang Professorship of Cognitive and Neural Systems at Boston University, held by Stephen Grossberg; see sites.bu.edu/steveg.
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Ravi, 28th May 2022: I am so glad that I have been able to complete this set of posts on An Wang and Wang Laboratories, as a gratitude offering to Wang Labs. company for their computer hardware and software systems, documentation and for my stints in Wang Labs. offices at Lowell, Massachusetts, USA and in Brussels, Belgium all of which played a huge role in me establishing myself in my professional career of software developer and (software) project leader/manager, and (as gratitude offering) indirectly to An Wang who was the founder and force behind Wang Labs. It is very interesting to me, an Indian born and residing in India, that a Chinese origin person (An Wang) indirectly played a significant role in the early days of my software development professional career. India and China are neighbouring countries who have had relations with each other over millennia even if relations between democratic India and communist China have not been so good in slightly more than the past half century. I hope and pray that India and China have good relations in the future.
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