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COMPUTERS: | opening frontiers for business and education LZ My y Computers come of age in Midland Computers are coming of age in Midland as Bay Real Estate shows off the company's more businesses, both large and small, turn recently acquired micro computer. TOP to them to free up employees to do other work. RIGHT, Janet Bidan of E.G. Mink Insurance through its paces. BOTTOM LEFT, Grade 10 student Guenther Kramer of Midland Secondary School learns the art of computer numbers into one of eight PET computers the school owns. BOTTOM RIGHT, Eleanor Walker of Walker's Electric uses the com- TOP LEFT, Ron Mink, president of Georgian is photographed putting the firm's computer by Doug Reed Midland Secondary School teaches '"'it."' Georgian Bay Real Estate, E. G. Mink Insurance, Walker's Electric and others use "them." What do the above four establishments have in common? Computers! Micro computers are creating new frontiers in both the field of education and business. For instance Midland Secondary School is teaching computer science to Grade 10 and 11 students with a great deal of success. The success story becomes much more evident when you see young people lined up before school starts in the morning and staying after school wraps up for the day so they can program their own data. A computer really is nothing more than the extension of the human brain designed to do away with tedious day to day repetitive work while at the same time it can be used for in- ventory control, billing, analysis, adinfinitum. A computer's ability is unlimited as officials of Georgian Bay Real Estate are finding out these days after in- stalling an in-house TRS 80 micro computer at their head office on Hugel Avenue in Midland. According to R. G. (Ron) Mink, president of the company, his computer will not do away with people but "will allow them greater opportunities to be freed up to do other things." The computer Georgian Bay Real Estate operates is capable of storing 4,000 listings on each storage disc: 16,000 on the discs the company owns. Clients "Any sales associate with our company can now provide our clients with selective properties searched in seconds, thereby eliminating the possibility of missing the very property that would suit them best,' observed Mink. The innovative programs the local real estate company has already implemented also allows the firm to key in such variables as the name of the vendor, salesman's name, price, deposit, closing date, type. size and area of property concerned, etc. The list goes on. Memory bank Programming all the facts initially can take time but the information can be retrieved in seconds from a memory bank when required and that's where the real savings in time takes place. Using a_type-writer- like keyboard the in- formation is 'punched in" and dispalyed on a screen, it's as simple as that...and then the in- formation is stored. What it comes down to is this...instant in- formation at the touch of a key or button. In future the real estate company may expand its operation to link up other offices in its network since really the sky's the limit in this field. Mink's brother Ernie who operates an_ in- surance business in the same building at 544 Hugel Ave., West, has been using a computer for almost a year. Accounts E. G. Mink's own operation handles 5,000 aecounts and all the related information and science as he programs a difficult series of it has the potential to have three and four times the amount of information on stream. _ At Walker's Electric it is much the same. Walker's installed their computer back in 1979 and since then has been doing yeoman's duty keeping track of in- ventories, pricing standard job quotations, etc. According to David Walker the computer also "ages" accounts receivable which otherwise would take days if not weeks to do. Walker who is also Tay Township's deputy- reeve found that through using a com- puter at his place of business there was a place for computers at the township level too. After some years of study the township last fall installed a computer of its own for water billings. It may also be used this year for tax billings. Which takes us back to where we started. We've mentioned four places in town where computers are busy performing duties they were programmed to do. Of course there are dozens of other places in Midland where com- puters are hard at work too. The question has been asked, will computers control people or will people control com- puters? We believe after talking to the people we have in preparation of this report, people will panv's computer for an inventory check. control computers. To be extremely ef- ficient in business today. more and more businesses large and small are going to turn to probably the best business tool on the market today...com- puters. No. computers won't do away with people, on the contrary, they will continue to expose this generation and the generations to come toa brand new world of technology where electronic chips, memory banks and cassette portfolios will be as common place as adding machines, typewriters and cash registers. Monday meeting 7:30 p.m. There's to be a regular meeting of Midland council, Monday at 7:30 p.m. in the council chambers. As usual these meetings are open to the general public. Friday, February 6, 1981, Page 3