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A machine that DOES
Page 47
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A far cry from the seaside talking weighing machine of yesteryear a speaking computer has been installed at Ford's giant parts distribution centre at Daventry. Known as the Direct Ord€ Limy System (DOES), it is to be linked to 550 terminals in dealers' premises The computer will answer questions about spares instantly, not in the strangulated quack of the Dalek tongue but in the dulcet voice of Jacqueline Rowan, and has a vocabulary of 129 words, excluding fantastic, fabulous, super, smashing and yeah. This is rather better than most school-leavers can now manage.
I understand that any attempt to chat up the machine is resisted with a blast on a klaxon.
At 5pm DOES knocks off for a pint but Ford says a dealer can still "askthe computer to record his order ready for processing at the earliest possible moment. Observe that the machine, as a member of the new master race, has to be treated with deference and requested to work. If coldly instructed it may blow a fuse.