The goal was to develop a handy analytical tool with a relatively simple user-oriented input and fast turnaround. This is usually accomplished by employing a free-format language translator. This option, however, was not used here because it would have entailed an additional overhead of fast core. The alternative was to use a different concept that serves the same objective while meeting the limitations of core usage set by the Digital Computer Laboratory (DCL) at the University of Illinois. This concept involved design¬ing the program to "talk" to the user. It obtains the data and instructions it needs by asking a series of questions which describe to the user the data he is expected to provide or the decisions he has to make. This is made more expedient by giving the user a chance to recover and correct the most likely mistakes during every phase of the input.
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