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1995-05-12
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IBM Press Release
OS/2 Warp Sets the Pace at Indy
OS/2 WARP TURNS INDY 500 RACE COURSE INTO 2.5-MILE
INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY
INDIANAPOLIS, May 6, 1995 . . .Starting today, IBM OS/2* Warp will turn
the "Greatest Race Course in the World" into a 2.5-mile information
superhighway.
An automatic transmitter-based timing system, running under OS/2, will
post the times and speeds of every car on every lap run in practice,
during the time trials beginning on May 13, and throughout the race on
May 28.
The system, which may be the world's most accurate method of motorsports
timing and scoring, was developed under a three-way partnership
agreement between the Speedway's management, led by Speedway President
Tony George, and the United States Auto Club (USAC), which sanctions the
Indy 500, with equipment and technological support from IBM's Personal
Software Products division.
The system works this way: Every Indy car that runs on the track
carries a transmitter on board that emits a constant signal. As a car
turns a lap, it crosses a series of loop antennas buried in the asphalt.
Each antenna picks up the transmitter's signal and feeds it to a local
area network running OS/2 LAN Server. There, custom-written application
software running under OS/2 translates the signal and displays the car's
time and speed on the IBM PC screen.
In addition to collecting timing information, an OS/2 Warp-based data
management system processes time and speed data from all of the cars and
distributes current standings to monitors around the track.
Art Graham, the Speedway's director of timing and scoring, said OS/2
Warp makes it easy to perform the challenging job of gathering data from
cars as they travel at speeds beyond 200 miles per hour. "Because we
are so confident in OS/2 Warp, we have installed it on the servers and
workstations across our IBM token-ring network," he said. "OS/2 Warp
allows up to 50 of USAC's users to immediately share timing and scoring
information generated by race cars. Everyone from crew chiefs in the
pits to fans in the stands depend on OS/2."
OS/2 Warp is the latest in a long line of IBM products used for
officiating the Indianapolis 500. IBM first scored the 500-mile classic
in 1927, using leased key punches and tabulators and has since formed a
68-year technology partnership with the Speedway.
While IBM technology in the world's richest auto race has progressed
from punch cards to personal computers which utilize OS/2 Warp, the
challenge has remained the same--to accurately clock the world's fastest
cars in an arena where a fraction of a second can mean the difference
between winning and losing.
OS/2 Warp is the third generation of IBM's award-winning 32-bit
operating system. It features impressive new usability features,
slimmed-down system requirements and comes with a BonusPak of more than
a dozen exploitive OS/2 applications, including easy access to the
Internet and CompuServe. OS/2 Warp comes preloaded on systems from the
IBM PC Company, Toshiba, CompuAdd, Vobis, Escom, and Osborne. Dell
offers OS/2 Warp as a preload option to customers when they order PCs.
* Indicates trademark or registered trademark of International Business
Machines Corporation.
Indianapolis 500, Indy 500, Indy, and The Greatest Race Course in the
World are registered trademarks of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway
Corporation, USA.