T O P C A T 2

By John Peck, Open Systems Management Consultant TOPCAT2 (www.topcat2.com), an automated test and survey tool, which delivers free AIX Certification sample tests, has had a long history for any web application - over 6 years. It was the first Customer-facing web application to be officially run by IBM - all else being just flat HTML pages. I believe it has been well received and I know it has been well used, peaking at over 6,000 AIX sample tests per month and still going. More than 200,000 people have visited the various TOPCAT web sites! The story began back in 1995... John Peck was running the IBM AIX training centre in Manchester, England. Nigel Wale had just joined the AIX Services group, from the CALL-AIX Support Centre. AIX Certification was new with paper-based IBM testing - the AIX Support Engineer (ASE) was the first exam to be created in the U.K.. A need was identified for a "crammer" revision course. The concept for ASEREV, as the ASE Revision workshop would be known, was a new way of working for IBM Education at is was then: Prospective students had to pass a paper-based entrance test to be sure that they had sufficient foundation knowledge. The results of the pre-tests were co-coordinated by hand and the class would be taken through those questions which were apparently not understood. Certainly not like a traditional IBM classroom course - there was no binder of handout materials, no fixed presentations with visual aids - instead, lots of white-board chalk-and-talk, demonstrations on a projected console, and only occasional random foil projector displays - all to tackle the specific needs of students. The end results were very encouraging - over a 90% pass rate in the later real exams.

John Peck is an Open Systems Specialist with thirteen years' experience of UNIX operating systems and systems administration - with ten years working for IBM. He has developed and delivered both a full range of AIX Education courses and several IBM standard Open Systems consultancy offerings. John consistently attracts exceptional feedback from clients, he was the highest customer rated instructor for IBM. John's technical skill covers a wide range - with expert depth in system security, TCP/IP networking and performance tuning. John created and managed IBM's original Open Systems training programme - ASSET. He was a technical mentor to both his IBM colleagues, and some senior Customers. John was the first U.K.-based reviewer for the IBM AIX World-wide Certification examinations - including ASA, ASP and CATE tests - he was rated "best AIX reviewer" by the U.S. programme owner. Open Systems consultancy offerings developed by John address issues such as system security, health checks and training programmes. He has designed and managed successful advertising for Education and other offerings. He co-developed TOPCAT, a web-site that has attracted much interest from those looking to be IBM Certified - IBM staff and Customers alike. Prior to joining IBM, John spent two years in the defence industry and one year with an insurance company. He managed a government research project using Oracle and Empress relational databases on HP-UX. He was responsible for application development, system installation and maintenance. John is accomplished in the use of relational database packages, he has used 4GLs and report writers extensively. He is also proficient in the implementation of office automation products under both UNIX and DOS.

Mailing out ASEREV tests and hand marking was time consuming. Nigel Wale, always aware of the latest technological possibilities, suggested web-based assessments. The proposed name was crafted so as to form an appealing acronym: The On-line Private Certification Assessment Tool - TOPCAT. Nigel created a range of cartoon cat images for a friendly look and feel - John designed the paw print, claw marks and cat litter backgrounds. Nigel's first version was run on a model 250 RS/6000 in the Manchester classroom. John and Nigel then re-worked and improved the code together as a spare-time project.

TOPCAT went live in 1996 at http://www.ibm.com/topcat (a now defunct URL). The RS/6000 team at IBM Austin very kindly provided a free home for the code on their main web server alongside the AIX on-line manuals and marketing pages. IBM Portsmouth also provided a free hosting service as a second server in the U.K.. AIX sample tests, newly written in IBM Austin, joined the original ASEREV option. Each question then allowed only single-selection from a plain text display. Users could apply for a free copy of the code - in the hope of selling a required RS/6000 web server to go with it!

The idea of recommending training that was appropriate to a user's needs, based on analysis of test results, appealed to IBM Education. But in the complex world of IBM bureaucracy, where Nigel and John worked in a different group to what would become IBM Learning Services, no funding or offical support was ever to be arranged. However, IBM Netherlands kindly provided free hosting for yet another server copy, and became the second country to offer ASEREV workshops under the excellent tutelage of Michael Felt, now based in Amsterdam. The ASEREV format continues to this day to be offered in several countries under various different course codes - the pre-test, recently partly updated for U.K. use by Simon Starkey, is still available through TOPCAT, although passing it is no longer mandatory for attending most of the classes.

Some people think IBM stands for I've Been Moved - certainly nothing stays the same for very long in the modern world. Nigel Wale joined a pre-sales & short-term services function based in Nottingham, where he still works. John Peck reverted to Services work when a covering cross-charging arrangement with the Education group was broken off - his last course was with Bill Moran in Atlanta. The AIX Certification Programme Manager role changed hands several times, currently it's Darin Hartman.

But the story does not end there - there were other uses of TOPCAT...

You may know that IBM has a large number of Project Managers working for it. There is of course an internal certification and training path. The PMSA - Project Management Self-Assessment was looking for a vehicle to deliver it worldwide and TOPCAT was selected. With the support of the enthusiastic and profesional team behind PMSA, Diane Holmes, Scott Wagert and Ray Talke in particular, TOPCAT was enhanced to provide much new functionality - multi-selection questions and ways to "dump" the data for further group analysis. Internal international cross-charging was set up to cover time spent handling FeedBacks and linking users back up with lost test URLs.

When once fashionable to do so, IBM decided to set-up a group focussed on providing Microsoft NT services. The lead on the group asked John to design a training path, which was done along the lines of ASEREV, with "crammer" courses where suitable. Four of an intended six exams were created for TOPCAT in conjunction with an independant Microsoft-approved training provider. NT4REV1,2,3 and 4 each giving very specific further study recommendations - listing particular pages to be consulted in Microsoft's standard materials. However, as the Microsoft-approved training partner was not interested in continuing with the idea alone, that's probably the only Microsoft stuff you'll see on TOPCAT. NT4 is now getting to be very "old-hat", but the Networking Essentials and TCP/IP questions will continue to be relevant - and very challenging.

Many thought it might be the end of the World. 1999 saw much year-2000 and other pain...

IBM decided to implement a new Global Web Architecture for all internal web hosting. The cost-saving architecture was not compatible with dynamic applications, not based on RS/6000 servers nor accessible as required by TOPCAT. With the IBM servers due to be closed down, John purchased a new RS/6000 B50 of his own to run the code on. http://www.topcat2.com has been the home ever since, based in Chester at The Virtual Business Centre, an ISP offering "co-location" services http://www.virtual-chester.com. During 2001, a way was found for IBM to again run a TOPCAT2 copy on a spare machine based at Frozen Leopard Inc (so very appropriate!) in California, so that now TOPCAT2 has a pair of public servers.

The IBM AIX Certification Programme cut their links from http://www.ibm.com/certify to TOPCAT2 in November 2001 - chosing instead to provide any new official AIX Sample Tests through a new company http://www.TesTrac.com, where users must pay a small fee for each test and enter numerous personal details. There are other fee-charging AIX certification preparation test providers: for example Boson Software http://boson.com, who are famous for tests about network products. Boson have had only a miniscule usage for their one AIX Support Test compared with TOPCAT and TOPCAT2.

TOPCAT2 has more operating features than any other similar software, and test hosting through it continues to be offered free of charge to IBM in special recognition of their assistance. John Peck does not believe it is right to charge for access to sample tests - IBM should cover the costs of test development from training course revenues. John, who was once a reviewer of the real exams, believes that less people will undertake testing as a result of the new fees and the level of AIX skills will drop as a result, ultimately leading to less pSeries platform sales and lower customer satisfaction.

Those official AIX tests still available on TOPCAT2 are expected to fall out of date in coming years, but it is hoped that other sources of material might replace that range in future. Contributors of questions would be welcome - all material would be checked before publication - there would be no remuneration for material supplied, just the thanks of those using it.

After 11 years, John Peck left IBM in August 2001 and now works for Acuma Solutions - an IBM Business Partner known for
Knowledge Solutions based on Business Intelligence and Data Warehousing technologies. Soon, Acuma Solutions will offer pSeries Service Checks through TOPCAT2 - a range of check-list options which provide recommended actions where system configuration tasks are identified as not completed. An on-line version of a "Health Check" report. Free to existing customers, it will also be available to all for a small fee payable to Acuma Solutions.

TOPCAT2 continues to be run and developed as a spare-time activity, so far funded only by John Peck. Recently added features now allow multiple questions within each question window, free-form text inputs, different marking methods including NSI Net Satisfaction Index surveys and Check-Lists with recommendations, plus a new question review mode which shows those questions not correctly answered. TOPCAT2 code continues to be issued as freeware for anyone to run or develop on.

John Peck and The Virtual Business Centre offer private web hosting services and hope to soon be the proud owners of an S7A
(recently one of the largest RS/6000s). The machine will be installed to the same secure and performant standards as those web servers installed by John at a certain major U.K. bank. Ideal for those looking to evolve from virus-ridden underpowered PC servers to a true Enterprise scale platform!