products

BICA Issue No. 7: January 1989

CSAC Software

This is a list of applications and databases which are available on Lucy: some are portable to other machines, some are very flexible, others are designed for very specific needs, but can be adapted, and in any case offer a model of how the machines can be used to solve particular problems. Please note that it is an abbreviated list: full details available on request to c-sac@uk.ac.ukc.

1. Dr. Nick Ryan. Gtree is a program for representing graphically information and the relations between items of information, such as genealogical data, social networks, and semantic categories (as well as Dr. Ryan's work in stratigraphy). Planned distribution is for UNIX (older version available), the Atari ST, MacIntosh+, and IBM PC compatibles.
2. Bricolog 15 Dr. Michael Fischer, Mr. Cris Simons. Bricolog works with data of the same sort as Gtree, but is more analytic in orientation. The basic data type is a set, with properties and relationships defined for these sets. Properties correspond to attributes such as sex, clan membership, occupation, and relationships correspond to relations between sets, essentially a set of relationships. At any time the contents of a set can be reported, either case by case or a simple count, or a crosstabulation. Planned distribution is for UNIX (beta available), the Atari ST, MacIntosh+, and IBM PC compatibles. C source available.
3. Notescan 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. Notescan is a program for accessing databases that are relatively unstructured, such as fieldnotes or open-ended interview material. It can however work with highly structured data as well, or a mixture. It requires no special file structure, the data can be entered using any conventional text editor, and can search up to 50 different files in a single query. Unlike some similar programs it requires no index. It is quite fast with hard disk systems, and can search about 100,000 characters per second. It is somewhat slower from floppy disks. C source available.
4. Bulletin Board 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A program for operating a bulletin board from a UNIX service machine. Includes a special shell which aids security for the host. In use at Kent for the Centre for Social Anthropology and Computing Bulletin Board, accessible by JANET and PSS. C source code available. (further development planned).
5. CrossCull 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. CrossCull is a program for interrogating the cross-cultural databases distributed by the World Cultures journal (Edited by Prof. D. White, UC, Irvine), as well as other sources. It offers quick cross-tabulations of cultures by variable (< one half second per table for the standard sample). Planned distribution is for MacIntosh (beta available). Turbo Pascal source available.
6. Assoc 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A teaching program for demonstrating categorical inheritance, whereby a category inherits the properties of dominating categories. This permits the student to test different structural models imposed over a set of categories. Available for UNIX. (works, no further development planned) C source available.
7. Parse 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A teaching program for demonstrating phrase structure grammars. The user writes a phrase structure grammar and can test target `sentences' against these rules to see if they are accounted for in the rules, and in how many different ways. Available for UNIX. (works, no further development planned) C source available.
8. Infer 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A teaching program for demonstrating expert systems, eg a simple expert system shell. Available for UNIX. (works, no further development planned) C source available.
9. Outline 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. An `ideas processor' or outline processor. Based loosely on a commercial program, ThinkTank (Living Video). Available for UNIX. (works, further development planned) C source available.
10. Menu 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A program for constructing menu driven environments by non-programmers. Specifically for UNIX. The Social Anthropology Bulletin Board is written in a variant of menu, called smenu, that can act as a standalone UNIX shell. Smenu includes security components making it reasonably safe for anonymous logins. Available for UNIX. (works, further development planned) C source available.
11. Cross/Freq Suite 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A crosstabs/frequencies program. A number of utilities are available for converting the output into table descriptions for nroff/troff, and plotting graphs using the UNIX plot library. Available for UNIX. (works, no further development planned) C source available.
12. Kapauku Simulation 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. This simulation contributed to the paper "Ecological Structure, Economics and Social Organization: The Kapauku", in New Trends in Mathematical Anthropology, (ed) G. De\0Meur, 1986. It is also used as a teaching aid for the Computing for Social Anthropologists course. Available for UNIX and TOPS20. (no further development planned) C source available.
13. !Kung Simulation 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A teaching simulation for exploring the relationship between the !kung bushman and their ecosystem. Available for UNIX. (works, no further development planned) C source available.
14. MapPlot 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A program for plotting variables associated with map coordinates onto a laserprinter (HP LaserJet) or Plotter (HPPL compatible), or graphic terminal (via UNIX plot). Used for both research and teaching. Available for UNIX. (works, further development planned) C source available.
15. Wterm 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A program that makes it easier to setup complex applications for beginners, by emulating the user typing commands. UNIX, C source code available. (no further development planned)
16. Codemaster 15 Dr. Michael Fischer. A program for solving simple substitution ciphers. Useful to introduce students to the keyboard, and to demonstrate how an interactive tool can help with a non-trivial problem. UNIX, C source code available. (no further development planned)
17. Yoruba Traders 15 Dr. Jerry Eades. A simulation of trading behavior among the Yoruba, developed as part of a research project. It is also used as a teaching aid for the Computing for Social Anthropologists course. Available for UNIX. Pascal source available. (further development planned)
18. Rels 15 Ms. Janet Bagg. An interactive program which builds a simple network of relationships between persons. While entering data from the keyboard decisions concerning the identity of persons are made on the basis of information already held in the database. Available for UNIX, C source code available. (A newer piece of software that is much more powerful will be available soon.)
19. NewsRead 15 Mr. Michael Meerman. A news reading and posting program, for use with programs such as the Bulletin Board, or as a general message center for a UNIX 4.1 or 4.2 host. C source code available. (further development planned).
20. Libent 15 Prof. John Davis. A menu-driven data-entry program, for work with documents from Libyan court archives. At the moment it is highly specific: a more generalised version is planned to allow users to define complex structures which are then used to derive prompts and storage. UNIX, Turbo C sources available. Databases

The databases are accessible through specific interfaces, or through the general Bulletin Baord, notescan, cross, freq &c.. All databases are or will be available on the Centre for Social Anthropology and Computing Bulletin Board.

a) Bibliographies.

b) Ethnographic data-bases: kinship, economic and political relations.

c). Ethnographic data-bases: Linguistic, taxonomic & medical.