Hilary P. Lancaster

Mr. Lancaster came to Walker Interactive Systems, Inc. via acquisition of from in September 1990. His title and responsibilities remained primarily the same with six direct reports. Development focus turned to the integration of CARMS with .

He contributed to the success of CARMS at Walker by developing EMS support for the Walker-middleware APIs and , as well as contributing CARMS technology to the packaging/delivery process. This significantly reduced the migration effort required to convert CARMS programs to the Walker APIs directly. It also meant that the "Classical CARMS" architecture with EMS remained nested within the "Classical Walker" architecture for the foreseeable future.

On the Technical Services front: the local data-center's shut down, migration from the primary service bureau on MVS to the corporate datacenter on VM/CMS, and relocation of the Chicago office to Oakbrook Terrace were his first priorities.

By June 1992, Mr. Lancaster had completed the integration projects over two releases of EMS and began to assist strategic planning with peers and senior management. He contributed to brainstorms or chalktalks, and authored brown papers to provide technical strategy on topics such as Unix-migration, Network Communication and Client/Server architecture.

In the spring of 1993, the Unix migration plan commenced. By the end of May, Mr. Lancaster completed the design and coding of the environment-specific character-terminal services.

This company started in the late 1970's building mainframe accounting software that was targeted toward multiple platforms (combinations of: OS, OLTP, and DBMS). During the 1990's the firm employeed over 250 personell. In 2003 Walker Interactive Systems changed it's name to "Elevon" and was subsequently acquired by SSA Global Technologies, Inc. The Walker applications are now marketed as SSA's Financial Management solution.

In 1990, Walker acquired the Credit and Accounts Receivable Management System (CARMS) from Global Software, Inc. This filled a gap in their application suite by providing the missing A/R functionality. CARMS with its homomorphic architecture was adapted to the Walker middleware in a nested fashion, bringing the integrated product to market quickly. To date, the A/R functionality continues to use the classical CARMS middleware API and conventions which in turn provide abstraction of the Walker IOSYS and Transaction Services APIs and conventions.

A strong point was the Walker Tools product that provided transaction control, validation, screen painting and report writing with which to build and extend the delivered applications. Another was the layered middleware classes that provided the abstract API with which to program data, screen, memory, and transaction access in different environments.

1993	Technology Planning Member Client/Server Architecture Planning Committee Migration path Upward compatibility Network Communications ASCII Terminal Support Distributed data and function Relational DBMS capabilities Sybase Oracle Ingres Informix UNIX OEM Partnership evaluations IBM AIX HP-UX Lead researcher and chair of selected Client/Server committees: Author "Network Communications" requirements documents using IBM GML Author "ASCII Terminal services" requirements documents using IBM GML Author "EMS Migration" requirements documents using IBM GML Framework Development WMS UNIX (HP-UX and SCO) development Author ASCII Terminal services functional specifications using IBM GML Design and code Terminal services common module using ANSI C using UNIX Curses functions Manage EMS Development Eliminate Redundancy Turnover responsibility for maintenance and Level III support to Framework department Teaching and Support Presale technical support at prospects' sites In-house technical support to development departments
1992	Technology Planning Member Level-II Strategic Planning Committee Data Dictionary National Language Support (DBCS) Relational Application's Design UNIX Platform Portability Process Model Reengineering Data Warehousing UNIX Planning Sub-Committee Lead researcher and chair Author "UNIX Port" white paper using IBM GML WMS Release 16.3 (staff of 5) Manage Framework Development Integration of AR packaging and delivery Implement AR Import for WMS packaging Manage EMS 3.1 Development DBIO support for IOSYS API Storage via SRVMOD API Batch Signon for Control Entity and Company Code Manage Quality Control CARMS 6.1 [MVS CICS DB2] packaging, and testing CARMS 6.1 [MVS CICS VSAM] packaging, and testing CARMS 6.1 MVS/IMS/IMS packaging, testing, and beta CARMS 6.1 [MVS CICS ADABAS] packaging CARMS 6.1 [DOS/VSE CICS VSAM] packaging WMS Release 16.2 (staff of 5) Manage and Develop EMS 3.0 TPIO support for Screenbuilder API Task Control via Foundation Elements API DBIO support for IMSdb partitioned-databases DB2 usability enhancements [VM CMS VSAM] implementation [MVS CICS VSAM] implementation [MVS CICS DB2] implementation [MVS CICS IMS/db] implementation Author "Environment Definition Table (EDT)" topic to include in Walker Framework Manual using IBM GML Manage Quality Control CARMS 6.0 [MVS CICS DB2] packaging, testing, production CARMS 6.0 [MVS CICS VSAM] packaging, testing, production Framework development Design and code multi-thread APLMOD for CICS COBOL VS Design and code dynamic Screen Attributes for Native-3270 message stream Design and code dynamic Screen Attributes for IMS/dc Message Format Service (MFS) Foundation Elements 2.2 development Design and code API for CUA-compliant panel elements Design and code panel-element subroutines Author "Panel Elements" topic of Foundations Elements Subroutine manual using IBM GML Teaching and Support National User Group Present "CARMS Integration" session Panel member for "Technical Roundtable" session Present "CARMS DB2 Multi-Company" session Presale technical support at prospect sites In-house technical support to development departments Level III EMS support (for CARMS)
1991	WMS Release 16.1 (staff of 6) Manage CARMS 5.2 development [MVS CICS DB2] configuration and implementation Data Dictionary conversion from IMAGINE to DDM Manage Quality Control CARMS 5.2 [MVS CICS DB2] packaging, testing, production Beta-test site support (onsite and other) Manage and Develop Framework AR File Access Modules for IOSYS API to start OLTP task from menu Design and code enhancements to IOSYS architecture for foreign VSAM files Desing and code IOSYS multi-company support by database for IMSdb Foundation Elements development Design Foreign-transaction (TID) definition Design Foreign-transaction menu process Manage CARMS 5.2 Development (staff of 6) [MVS CICS VSAM] configuration and implementation [DOS/VSE CICS VSAM] configuration and implementation [MVS CICS IMS/db] configuration and implementation [MVS CICS ADABAS] configuration and implementation Manage Quality Control (staff of 2) CARMS 5.2 [MVS CICS VSAM] packaging, testing, production CARMS 5.2 [DOS/VSE CICS VSAM] packaging, testing, production CARMS 5.2 [MVS CICS IMS/db] packaging, testing, production CARMS 5.2 [MVS CICS ADABAS] packaging, testing, production Technology Planning Contributing Author CARMS Development Plans 1991-1993 CARMS Integration Requirements Technological integration committee Business Functionality integration committee Author presentation to National User Group Teaching and Support National User Group Present "CARMS Integration Requirements" session Co-chair "CARMS Technical Roundtable" session Presale technical support at prospect sites In-house technical support to development departments Level III EMS support (for CARMS) Manage Technical Services (staff of 2) Manage Data Centers Migration Migrate all from service bureau to corporate data center Deinstall IBM 9370 Deinstall VAX 3800 Office Relocation Assist Environment planning for office build-out Relocate office environment to new building Expand Desktop computing environment at new location Maintain new T1 (MCI) network connection
1990	CARMS 5.1 Development (staff of 6) Manage EMS 2.5 Development [MVS CICS DB2] configuration and implementation [MVS CICS ADABAS] configuration and implementation Manage Quality Control CARMS 5.1 [MVS CICS VSAM] packaging, testing, production CARMS 5.1 [DOS/VSE CICS VSAM] packaging, testing, production CARMS 5.1 [MVS CICS IMS/db] packaging, testing, production CARMS 5.1 [MVS CICS ADABAS] packaging, testing, production CARMS 5.1 [MVS CICS DB2] packaging, testing, production

From: "The Walker Bridge" 1992 Q4