From Item To Information

1. From Item To Information SIR Databases in BGU School of Medicine David de Leeuw Ben Gurion University of the Negev david@bgumail.bgu.ac.il June 2001

2. Historical Overview - I • 1982: SPSS was the main analytical tool used at Ben Gurion University • We understood we had a problem with data-management of “non-flat” files • A salesperson presented SIR in the university. With its close relationship to SPSS, SIR seemed to be just the tool we were looking for.

3. Overview II • 1982 to 1988 Intensive use of SIR for students administration and a number of research projects. • In 1988 at the SIR conference in Chicago Tony gave us a diskette with SIR/TEXT. • Soon we recognized its use as a tool to manage our examinations and questions bank.

4. Overview III • Since 1988 we developed a fully integrated management system (all in Hebrew) for the medical school. • In 1997 a School in International Medicine was established (in English) with Columbia University. • Both schools now run all exams from the SIR database • Also national final exams of four medical schools are produced from the database

5. Some details We run about 300 exams a year All is automated using specialized scanning software, VB, Pascal, 80 Sir databases for exam generation and 2 Sir database for student data. Runs in Hebrew and English

6. Production of exams • Exams are generated in a number of versions • Questions may be chosen randomly, according to subject, previous use, other statistical criteria or by hand • Output is produced camera-ready, including images • Reports are produced for evaluation • Key for analysis of the exam is generated • Statistics are read back to the bank

7. Students information system-terminal entry and retrieval (SISTER) • Runs almost 20 years without major changes • Interfaces automatically with examination analysis software • Produces all reports and forms by student, and by class • Interfaces with the University students management system

9. My experience • Based on years as a programmer, designer, manager, analyst, user, husband of programmer concerning • Mumps, Magic, Dbase, Paradox, Access, SQLServer, Oracle and SIR

10. SIR and Total Cost of Ownership • “Total Cost of Ownership (TOC) includes all of the costs involved in operating networks and computers, whether leased or owned. It is traditionally used by businesses to help control costs and make strategic decisions.” • http://www.cosn.org/tco/about.html

11. Points of discussion • Servers and operating systems • PQL Vs. SQL • Stability, bugs and crashes • DBA, tuning and management • Support • Development tools • Manpower

12. Servers and operating systems • We use and used SIR on all kinds of operating systems (CDC/NOS, NOS/VE, VAX, IBM UNIX, Linux, Win98, WINNT) • We never needed to buy or replace a computer for SIR but used what is available. Our present main server is a six years old IBM/AIX system. Performance over the years improved incredibly.

13. PQL vs. SQL • In my opinion PQL follows the human mind much more closer than SQL. • Especially if a number of “ifthen” statements are involved in a multiple record-type retrieval, SQL statements get extremely complicated. I never came across a problem of data retrieval and analysis PQL couldn’t handle effectively and elegantly.

14. Stability, bugs and crashes • Our main applications still run Sir 3.2 (a 1993 release!). We are soon moving all to 2002. • We never encountered unexpected crashes. • With a code base of about 15000 lines, there are just a few dealing with workarounds for bugs.

15. DBA, Tuning and management • DBA, Tuning etc. I understand a “DBA” (Database Administrator) is a well paid job, tuning disk-sizes, blocks and pointers to keep the database healthy. I have been running SIR databases of hundreds of thousands of records on IBM XT. Never came across an issue of DBA management.

16. Support • One company (guess..) we pay money for a subscription on their problems database. From that company we never got answers on any problem. • SIR as a small company provides a very direct link with the developers. Participating in beta-tests, we are very confident that all we need runs perfectly in the next release.

17. Development tools • My wife was at an Oracle course on Developer 2000, while I was at a lecture by a senior Oracle rep, who declared Developer 2000 “dead” (and this in the year 2000) • The SIR philosophy of having the tools generate PQL is important to prevent endless conversion problems between application and application

18. Manpower • Maybe the weakest link as far as Sir is concerned: There are no SIR programmers around. We need to train a programmer from scratch. • Any programmer can become proficient in SIR in a number of weeks.

19. Subjective score for SIR • Servers and operating systems ++ • PQL Vs. SQL ++ • Stability, bugs and crashes ++ • DBA, tuning and management ++ • Support ++ • Development tools +/- • Manpower -

20. Total Cost of Ownership - TOC • Considering total expense [hardware+ software+ maintenance+ licenses+manpower+development time+ support] divided by [database size* complexity * application-lifetime] SIR is a definite candidate to have the lowest TOC of all.

21. Thank you !