I didn't find it unbelievable for them to have terminals, what I found unbelievable was for them to ok some ticket vouchers and them show up again on a second search a minute later. back then there was no centralized internet and everything was done via phone modem.
The terminal is simply displaying output from a program running on a remote host.
Swissair's host computer in this case would be a mainframe class computer. Given that, I see nothing unrealistic about what the airline agent did, nor the results of either the first or second query. If the ticket information had not been populated into the database on the host when the query was initiated by the agent, then the response on the terminal would indicate that there is no reservation. The first time a query is initiated after the database is populated, the ticket and reservation information would be displayed on the terminal screen. This is similar in principle to clicking "refresh" using a web browser to view the most up-to-the-second information like live sports scores, election returns, etc. (In recent years, the wide adoption of web standards like AJAX has largely reduced the necessity to click refresh repeatedly).
I used to run a BBS waaay back when, and just connecting via phone modem and exchanging info packets with systems we networked with could take 10-15 minutes and that was in the same city for just a few messages back and forth.
that's assuming it was successful on the first try.
It sounds like you are trying to equate or compare terminal remote host user operations with remote file transfer operations. Since you were a BBS sysop, you'll remember that users could interact directly with your system by reading, posting or responding to email from other users, reading/posting on SIGs (Special Interest Groups) message boards, or browsing your "Files" section. This all occurred at a connection speed (i.e. 1200 bps, 2400 bps, 9600 bps, etc) supported by and agreed upon by both modems. Essentially, this was a character-based exchange of information and commands. This call and response type of computing is part of the concept called transactions processing. That is effectively what most centralized hosts connected to dumb serial terminals did. The
Swissair ticket counter terminal was just a dumb serial terminal connected to a remote centralized host.
The long waiting game you described occurred when a user or another BBS downloaded or uploaded files. You'll remember that a file-transfer protocol (i.e. Xmodem, Ymodem, Zmodem, Kermit, etc.) was used to accomplish this. Generally speaking, dumb serial character terminals like the one at the
Swissair ticket counter were incapable of file transfers for obvious reasons, so slow binary file transfers to/from a BBS, has little in common with the character terminal query scene at the airport in
Argo.
Let's say you had a multiline (or a multinode) BBS. (I know most BBSes in the 1980s and early 1990s were single-line, allowing only one connection at a time, but I am pretty sure that you are familiar with BBSes that were capable of concurrent connections). User A dials in and he checks to see if he has any email at 1:00:16pm. The BBS responds that there is no new email for User A. User B dials in and she composes an email addressed to User A and sends it at 1:00:26pm. User A checks for mail again at 1:00:36pm. The BBS responds by indicating that User A now has new mail. After the BBS program assigns the email message to User A's mailbox, any mail query by User A will receive a response indicating that he has a new email message waiting to be read. This concept is similar to what happened in
Argo. Once the airline tickets are paid for and the reservation process is completed and the host database is updated accordingly, any query from any connected terminal would receive a response showing the reservation and ticket information. So, the scene is not really that unrealistic in terms of identical queries yielding different results from a centralized host system, even when the queries are submitted mere seconds apart.
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Ironman54
10 years ago
I remember the Commodore 64 and setting baud rates with a friend down the street just to send text - a real pain !! The message would start to come through and suddenly turn into gibberish. But at the time, we thought we were on the cutting edge. Then came BASIC etc
LOL !! Never envisioned the 'internet' as we now know it. Amazing times ...
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