orage medium. Magnetic drums, magnetic - disk packs, or magnetic tapes were usually used. When the computer finished with a problem, it "dumped" the whole problem (program and results) on one of these peripheral storage units and started on a new problem. Another mode for accessing these fast, powerful machines was called time-sharing. In time-sharing, the computer processes many jobs in such rapid succession that each job runs as if the other jobs did not exist, thus keeping each "customer" satisfied. Such operating modes needed elaborate executable programs to attend to the administration of the various tasks. In the 1960's, efforts to design and develop the fastest possible computer with the greatest capacity reached a turning point with the LARC machine, built for the Livermore Radiation Laboratories of the University of California by the Sperry - Rand Corporation, and the Stretch computer by IBM. The LARC had a base memory of ninety-eight thousand words and multiplied in ten Greek MU seconds. Stretch was made with several degrees of memory having slower access for the ranks of greater capacity, the fastest access time being less then one Greek MU second and the total capacity in the vicinity of one hundred million words. During this period, the major computer manufacturers began to offer a range of capabilities and prices, as well as extras such as consoles, card feeders, page printers, cathode-ray-tube displays, and graphing devices. These were widely used in businesses for accounting, payroll, inventory control, ordering supplies, and billing purposes. CPU's for these uses did not have to be very fast arithmetically and were usually used to access large amounts of records on file, keeping these up to date. By far, most computer systems were sold for simpler uses, such as for hospitals to keep track of patient records, medications, and treatments given. They were also used in libraries, like t...
