A dedicated computer facility at the University of Illinois

The University of Illinois is fortunate to have a wide variety of computer resources. The academic computer center at the Urbana-Champaign campus offers an IBM 360/75 with over 3 M bytes of core, many RJE stations and a recently installed dual CPU DEC-System-10 to provide the campus with time-sharing. The DEC-10 is interfaced locally to the 360/75 to permit users to edit files on the DEC-10, submit Jobs to the 360/75 and receive results via the DEC-10. The 360/75 is also linked (via 9600 baud lines) to computers at the University's two Chicago campuses, a 370/158 at Chicago Circle and a 370/155 at the Mecial Center. These computers provide general computing service support to the University's programs of instruction and research (i.e. separate computing facilities are used for administrative data processing).

Also there are several dedicated computer facilities at Urbana-Champaign, the largest University of Illinois campus. Certainly the most well-known is PLATO which is a CDC Cyber-73 dual CPU system dedicated to computer-aided instruction. Capable of handling hundreds of on-line students or course writers, the network of plasma panel PLATO terminals are installed throughout the world. Of course the largest concentration is in Urbana-Champaign, where many college courses are given entirely by PLATO.