they knew there was a site license there
they wanted my lab system

well hell
i made a huge mistake
streets heaver had sites and would take half off it (51%)
for some STUPID REASON and I still to this day don't know why
I wrote and turned them down

that was crazy
at some stage around that time I had been interviewed by a company
which was in a private house (then)
the guy running it was saying we are expanding so fast - this system
is going crazy - we have sites all over the place -- no room its on
fire this system (AREV)

mine could have been like that hell I don't know
that guy was writing software for the new GP setup

tbh ----- what I needed was sales people like the sales people at the
EDI place I worked for (compument) - technical sales people - I needed
to get a salesperson onto it right away

I ended up at some kind of a new business thing in st helens - with
signwriters etc
I just felt -- maybe somebody should have taken that in hand

let me describe -- arev stripped down -- nothing on it
I had even stripped windows down to implement a security system - the
security was available so that specific users could only see specific
data (through the actual system data entry screens) -- that was pretty
unique

the form report generator on AREV i didn't feel was up to the task so
I wrote a better one
the statistical report generator too (a better one)
it was rock solid on a 486DX2 -- a couple of years ago it was still
there (but overheating) they had a cold air conditioner over it ....
eventually it failed

I went down there and in a day put a new 486DX2 into its place
fixed I think a cable problem
found out that somebody had made a botch job of the cable

in being led to a store-room to get an old 486 I was treated with
absolute indifference - contemt even - I just did not understand ....
but then again

that day --- the lab had an inspection -- they later lost their
accreditaiton because the decent guy left and they got someone
incompetent in

shame really -- it was a very high turnover business (because of the
lab system)

it had comms which could be configured by the lab manager

..... I'm thinking now why I was treated with contempt by that person
who showed me where to get the new PC
It was because I yelled down the phone at them and said I was coming
to get the money NOW (etc)
they were late payers

reportedly the accountant there was involved in some kind of fraud

thats it ... i'm losing track ..... that was about the time I ended up
in hospital
it was partly to do with losing money

about the time chip and pin came in --- and the mental ward seemed to
be full of people who had met some crisis through forgetting their pin
number (I had too)

that was the last time I saw the lab system .... I don't even have a
copy
it went nowhere but it ran that lab for many many years

LABSYS

I can't even recall how I got involved with streets heaver
at one point there was talk about demonstrating the system at the
healthcare exhibition in halifiax

it was the only LIMS that could talk to a KONE biochemical analyser
I was making all kinds of plans for further comms -- but it just
stopped

my problem was I think that it was still based on DOS .... I just felt
that I had been left behind (even though it really didn't matter)

shame really
......

the system was so tight it actually had a build
you periodically rebuilt everything

it was written from the ground up
I used COMM-LOG a suite of communications TSRs

even that I stripped to bits
very good stuff

the point was -- to get data from the machines and onto the machines
as I said -- a lab manager could configure the system for any new
machine

THAT was advanced
but it was really the security (using modified filing systems) that I
figured was most advanced
there was a lot of code in there
a hell of a lot of code

i knew AREV inside out
upside down and backwards