Alan,

On Wed, 30 May 2007 21:12:30 +0100, Alan B. Pearce wrote:

> >There was (and maybe still is) a similar method commonly used for
> >handling data entry years ago.  You'd get two people to type something
> >in, then run a diff on it.  A third person then went thru & cleaned up
> >the errors.  To increase accuracy you'd have more typists, as two
> >people may make the same error.
> 
> The Inforex key to disk capture systems we used to use did that. First 
> operator would key a batch in, and it got loaded to disk. Second operator 
> keyed same batch and it compares to first operator input. I don't know how 
> it flagged differences or resolved them. It was a pretty early system and 
> had minimal smarts, so I guess it printed out and it was manually resolved. 

It's called "verifying" and it dates back to punchcards, where the verifying process would read the card and compare against the typed character - if 
they differed it would lock the keyboard (literally, the keys wouldn't move so the operator knew there was a problem).  In the case of a card it may 
have to be re-punched, but when key-to-disk systems took over the operator would look at the input form and the screen and decide who was right, 
and press the appropriate button to tell the system.  It always amazed me that punchgirls (they were always girls) could hold a perfectly good 
conversation with several others while doing their work at full speed (which could be well into 3 figures of keystrokes per minute).

Cheers,



Howard Winter
St.Albans, England


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