The Olympic Games in Atlanta rely on OS/2 Warp
by John McDonald
The Centennial Olympic Games this summer in Atlanta will be the largest sporting event ever held in the history of the planet. Over 190 countries will compete in 271 different events. Over 10,000 athletes will converge on Atlanta, along with hundreds of thousands of support people, judges, staff and spectators, and the biggest job of all falls to OS/2 Warp and IBM, the official Worldwide Technology Sponsor. Warp once again is up to the challenge.
The organizers of the Olympic Games knew they needed a partner that could deliver - someone who they could count on to have the hardware, software, and expertise to tie it all together reliably. That's why IBM was chosen to be their partner through the Olympic Games in the year 2000 in Sydney, Australia - a partnership of unheard of length and commitment. The Olympic organizers also knew the system had to be easy to use and 100% reliable - so the natural choice was OS/2 Warp.
The heart of the IBM involvement in the Olympics is the incredible Results System, a network of over 250 Warp Server Local Area Networks and 2 complete Wide Area Networks. 37 different event-specific applications are run on systems varying widely from IBM System/390 mainframes down to ThinkPad pen based computer systems running OS/2 Warp. For example, all of the judges are equipped with the Warped ThinkPads, and can mark down their results with a touch of the pen. That data is fed back into the DB2 and CICS systems for recording and instant broadcast throughout the entire network. Swatch timing systems are also directly integrated into the system to report scores for timed events.
Another major challenge solved by IBM was how to keep all those participants updated with information, transportation, results - and even E-mail. The massive Info '96 system was the solution to the problem. The point of contact for most of the users of the system is 1,800 IBM kiosks and user terminals running multimedia OS/2 Warp applications. These are tied to an AS/400 Advanced Series server that stores over 60 gigabytes of information that can be accessed with just a touch of the screen. Just a username and password opens up the system for the user. In this way, athletes can keep in touch with each other and their friends and family at home, view information about events and results, and even make dinner reservations.
Another place where you will find IBM technology is the huge Internet site located at http://www.atlanta.olympic.org. IBM provides fans with information on locations and times of events and venues, travel and ticketing tips, images, results and other information. You can also purchase merchandise online at the web site. The system is connected behind the scenes to the Results System and the Info '96 system. The system is also providing day-to-day coverage of the Torch relay, as well as other information leading up to the event.
For the 2 billion people expected to tune in to the Olympic Games, IBM has provided the Commentator Information System. Designed around IBM systems running a touch-screen OS/2 Warp application, sportscasters can view instantaneous results of all of the events - without having a huge production team "on the ground". Each individual commentator can even customize the system to their own needs, for example, having a particular country be automatically highlighted for them. Easy to use "tabbed notebooks" allow the commentators to organize and display information in any way they like. Truly an incredible system, brought together by IBM and OS/2 Warp.
As you can see, once again IBM and OS/2 Warp have been called upon to deliver a system that is as reliable and easy to use - and OS/2 Warp is up to the challenge. You can get more information on IBM's presence at the games by looking at http://www.olympic.ibm.com.
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