Design and development of SINK, a software INteractions knowledge system

The objective of this project has been to develop the SINK (Software Interactions Knowledge) system based on the client-server paradigm. The SINK knowledge server allows information about interactions between switching systems’ software features to be retrieved by users on the Bell-Northern Research (BNR) network. The clients of the SINK system have a X Window System graphical user interface written to conform to the interface design principles laid down in the OSF/Motif style guide. A number of important issues relating to the design of client-server applications and graphical user interfaces are dealt with in this project.

The SINK (Software Interactions Knowledge) system will serve as a central repository of corporate knowledge at Bell-Northern Research about its switching software assets and the interactions between those assets. The SINK system will help increase the productivity for designers and improve understanding about feature interactions as it provides a comprehensive source collected previously from many sources for a wide spectrum of information about existing switching software assets and their interactions.