Tölvumál - 01.06.1982, Blaðsíða 3

TÖLVUMÁL
3
Erik Bruhn, aðalritari Nordisk Dataunion:
Information processing at the present, and future trends with
special emphasis on the development in the Nordic countries
Erindi, flutt á ráöstefnunni "Datadagur '82", 23. april 1982.
I still wonder, why Mr. Thorhallsson chose
me for the opening session. And reflect-
ing about the reason I have chosen to see
it that the first human being ever to put
sence to the theory, which makes the basis
for the origin of EDP, was a Dane. The
Danish prince Hamlet, who proclamed "to
be or not to be".
Being the Nestor within the Nordic associa-
tion work, I would like to take the oppor-
tunity to express how very pleased I am
that the Nordic Dataunion is gathered today
in Iceland. On several occasions the Nor-
dic Dataunion has been in contact with
the Icelandic Society for Information Proc-
essing. We all hope that this visit will
give rise to the establishment of a regular
exchange of experience also with the Ice-
landic Society.
With the consent of Mr. Thorhallsson I
would like to start up my lecture by giv-
ing an outlook on the association back-
ground and how the cooperation within NDU
was built up.
Sweden was the first country to have a
Society for data users - the Society for
rational data processing - which was
established in 1949. In 1964 the Society
was given a new name - the Swedish Socie-
ty for Data Processing - and worked with
three regional centres round a central
body. One for the southern part, another
for the western part and the third cover-
ing northern Sweden, including Stockholm.
The Society now amounts to approx. 3.200
members. 75% of the members belong to the
Stockholm region.
In 1953 a punched card club, called TEAM,
was established in Norwav■ At the beginning
the activities were concentrated in the
Oslo region. Not long after similar clubs
was formed in Bergen, Rogaland and
Trondheim, and all of these clubswere
joined together in the Norwegian Computer
Society. The Society consists of 9 regional
divisions coordinated by a central body.
The members in Norway amounts to 3-600.
More than 50% originates to the biggest
of the divisions, the one covering the
Oslo area.
The next Society that grew up was a punch-
ed card Society in Finland also establish-
ed in 1953- Through coordinating a series
of regional divisions throughout Finland
an organisation was formed in 1972, the
Finnish Data Processing Association. This
organisation consists of 16 regional divis-
ions of which 3 are only for students.
The total amount of members is 10.800,
representing 600 companies.
In Denmark the Danish Data Processing Asso-
ciation was established in 1958. Today
the Association amounts to 1.400 members.
In 1960 the Norwegian and Swedish Associat-
ion for Data Processing was establishéd.
These two organisations were one of the
results of the NORDSAM conference held
in Landskrona, Sweden, in 1959. The Nor-
wegian organisation amalgamated with the
original Norwegian Society for Informat-
ion Processing.
The Swedish Society for Information Proces-
sing today functions as an independent
association having 2000 members. This
means that Sweden is the only Nordic coun-
try with two major associations.
Last in line - on April 6, 1968 - came
The Icelandic Society for Information Pro-
cessing.
FOUNDATION 0F THE NORDIC ASSOCIATIONS
1949 Sweden - The Swedish Society for
Data Processing
(The Society for Rational
Data Processing).
1953 Norway - The Norwegian Computer Society.
(TEAM)
1953 Finland - Finnish Society for Infor-
mation Processing
(The Punched Card Society)
1958 Denmark - The Danish Data
Processing Association
1960 Sweden - The Swedish Society for
Information Processing.
1968 Iceland - The Icelandic Society
for Information Processing.
The figures I have just given you cannot,
unfortunately, be compared to each other,
as the individuel Society has different
creteria for membership.
At an early date Nordic cooperation was
established in different ways. In 1959
a seminar was given for R&D oriented peop-
le. The name of the seminar was NORDSAM,
and it was carried through up to 1966
with a last gathering in Copenhagen,
which the Danish Association for Data
Processing and the Acadamy for the technic
sciences were responsible for.
The objective of the latter seminar was
to establish a contact between scientists
and users because NORDSAM had become too
one-sided science oriented.
As a consequence of this cooperation be-
tween the data association and the NORD-
SAM surroundings it was agreed to arran-
ge NORDSAM together with the Norwegian
Data Days in Oslo in 1967. As from 1968
the Nordic associations took over the ar-
rangement and the NordDATA tradition was
established giving the first conference
in Helsinki in 1968. NordDATA has been
a yearly event ever since with the excep-
tion of 1974, when the Swedish associat-
ions were host for the international IFIP
conference.