DECISIONSCRIPT TM. What Makes DecisionScript Unique? Vanguard. Features At-a-Glance

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Marilyn Hampton
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Vanguard DECISIONSCRIPT TM Intelligent Web Sites for E-Business DecisionScript is a Web application server and development platform for building server-side, JavaScript applications that use

Unlike static web sites, which can engage visitors with simple questions and answers, DecisionScript interacts with each visitor during his/her own session on a server by dynamically constructing

1 Vanguard DECISIONSCRIPT TM Intelligent Web Sites for E-Business DecisionScript is a Web application server and development platform for building server-side, JavaScript applications that use artificial intelligence. It is the first tool on the market developed explicitly for Web designers who build sites with decision-making capabilities. Unlike static web sites, which can engage visitors with simple questions and answers, DecisionScript interacts with each visitor during his/her own session on a server by dynamically constructing individualized Web pages in response to the information the visitor supplies. With this technology, businesses can close marginal sales opportunities, cross-sell related products, and provide after-sales support. Our Jupiter Cellular site is a good example of this. Automated help desks, Product locators, Wizards, and other Customer support applications can all be quickly and easily built using DecisionScript s enhanced version of JavaScript no need to learn a new language. But DecisionScript is not limited to just sales-related Web sites A broad spectrum of businesses and organizations including finance, medicine, manufacturing, government, education, etc., are applying DecisionScript's technology in tasks ranging from publishing real-time data on corporate Intranets to performing medical diagnoses or stock valuations. No matter the size or complexity, DecisionScript applications will deliver very fast, active content; and, DecisionScript will work with all Web browsers. See for yourself by taking a look at a few of the Example Scripts on our web site. DecisionScript Author Screen What Makes DecisionScript Unique? DecisionScript gives you the ability to create a "Smart site" by providing you with the technology for embedding intelligence in your Web site. Incorporating this technology allows you to give your visitors a unique and stand-out experience. Features At-a-Glance Dynamically interact with your Web site visitors Use session processing to treat all interaction with visitors as a single session Develop scripts using an innovative, unencumbered architecture Build complex scripts quickly and cost-effectively Provide speedy responses for visitors

Current, state-of-the-art Web sites apply transaction processing technologies and database connectivity which allows customers to go into a store and actually purchase products.

2 The DecisionScript Advantage: Knowledge-based Web Sites Early Web sites were little more than electronic brochures. This is like having a store where products are displayed in the front window, but the door is locked. Customers can see the products, but they cannot buy them. Current, state-of-the-art Web sites apply transaction processing technologies and database connectivity which allows customers to go into a store and actually purchase products. Although a big step forward, a key component is still missing-- there are no salespeople in the store to assist customers... This is where DecisionScript comes in. DecisionScript allows Web designers to add intelligent, interactive applications to Web sites that: assist customers in finding the right products, close marginal sales opportunities, cross-sell related products, and provide after-sales support. It interacts with visitors by asking questions and dynamically individualizing Web pages. Part of what makes DecisionScript unique is that it allows each Web site visitor to interact with his/her own session running on a Web server - this is like having a separate salesperson for each visitor who enters a site. Add Knowledge To Your Web Site Vanguard's DecisionScript Web server technology is entirely different from other Web server software in that it allows designers to build sites that contain knowledge rather than information. For example, imagine a Web site that acts like an online doctor. You go there when you are sick and the site asks you a series of questions about your symptoms leading to a diagnosis and recommended treatment. The diagnostic process is just like what a salesperson does to help a customer find a product, or what a technical support person does to help a customer resolve a problem. A traditional Web site can give you plenty of information to read so that you can diagnose your own illness, but information overload is the biggest problem with the Web today. A Web site with knowledge can actually diagnose your illness for you without you ever having to understand how it works. You get only the information you want--the final diagnosis and recommended treatment. Dynamically Interact With Web Site Visitors To put knowledge on a Web site, you need true session processing technology and decision-making methods. DecisionScript is unique in that it possesses both of these capabilities. DecisionScript's core technology is the result of seven years of research and development. One of its underlying strengths is that it treats all interaction with a particular visitor as a single session. This is distinct from traditional Web servers that treat all page requests as separate, unrelated transactions. DecisionScript combines session-processing technology with a variety of widely-used decision-making techniques. Developers don't need to know programming or even HTML to build sites.

3 Let's consider an online doctor. In the real world (not online) a single doctor will sit with you and ask questions. The doctor remembers the answers to each question and all subsequent questions reflect that knowledge. In contrast, the real-world equivalent of a Web-based doctor built with traditional Web technology is like this: A doctor enters your room and asks you a question. Before you answer, the doctor leaves and another doctor enters to hear your answer. This second doctor then formulates the next question and leaves before you answer it. The third doctor enters to hear the answer to the second doctor's question, but has no knowledge about the first doctor's question. With DecisionScript, you get web interaction that resembles the real-world doctor experience. DecisionScript remembers each visitor's responses, and all the information gathered throughout the session is reflected in DecisionScript's interaction with the visitor. Work Within A Simple Architecture Building a true decision-making application using traditional Web architecture is extraordinarily complex. The diagnostic process must be broken down into separate segments of program code to be placed in separate Web pages. Furthermore, the logic required to interpret the answer to a question must be in a separate file from the actual question. There is no way to build a single knowledge base that controls the entire process. Instead, you wind up with a system that is spread across hundreds of separate files with complex interdependencies. DecisionScript, on the other hand, is based on a completely different architecture. Rather than embedding program code in pages, DecisionScript embeds pages in program code. The program code is like a doctor's knowledge base, it determines what questions the doctor needs to ask. The pages are like the actual utterances of questions the doctor might ask. When a visitor first enters a site, DecisionScript begins a new session that controls everything about the visitor's experience. This is like interacting with a single doctor rather than a stream of different doctors to whom you must repeat your medical history. Scripting That's A Close Match To Human Thinking Probably the most important discovery that came out of Artificial Intelligence (AI) research is that the key to AI lies in building a programming environment that makes it easy to translate an expert's decision-making process into code. Existing Web server technologies are based on an architecture that is so unlike the human process that decision-making applications are all but impossible. However, DecisionScript has a development environment that provides a close match to human thinking. Vanguard is a pioneer in combining AI technology with decision-analysis techniques. Using AI as the "glue" that binds advanced analytic methods together makes for some very powerful possibilities. For example, if you want to build a system that estimates the value of a company, you can use AI technology to determine the most appropriate valuation method (discounted cash flow, earnings multiple, asset-based, option pricing, etc.) and then use analytic analysis to apply the chosen method. Before the Internet, decision-analysis techniques were used by a small number of people who became experts with their chosen software. Now, the Internet makes it possible for a large number of people to apply decision-analysis techniques to routine problems, such as product selection.

Build Complex Scripts Quickly and Cost- Effectively Building scripts using DecisionScript is far quicker and much less expensive in terms of development time than CGI programming, Active Server

4 Build Complex Scripts Quickly and Cost- Effectively Building scripts using DecisionScript is far quicker and much less expensive in terms of development time than CGI programming, Active Server Pages, and similar methods of server-side scripting. This speed and low cost makes it possible to build applications that change frequently. In addition, DecisionScript's efficiency allows designers to build complex systems such as medical diagnostic tools--applications that simply cannot be built using traditional Web development tools. To ensure speed in building scripts, DecisionScript uses an enhanced version of JavaScript as its core programming language. This allows designers to use the same language for both server-side and client-side development of active Web content. Web designers can begin scripting without having to learn a new language; plus, they can freely move components they have developed between the server and client environments without re-coding. Provide Speedy Responses for Visitors Developing a Web site's active content as server-side applications has a number of advantages over client-side scripting. The most important is that the applications will work with all Web browsers because very little functionality is required of the browser. In addition, the active content is very fast. There is no delay as is required when downloading applets to the user's browser. And, since DecisionScript is optimized to give performance that is up to 100 times the speed of client-side scripts, visitors get results instantly.

Frequently Asked Questions What do I need to begin using DecisionScript? You will need a computer running Windows 95, 98, NT 4.0, 2000, Me, or XP and a copy of DecisionScript Author.

5 Frequently Asked Questions What do I need to begin using DecisionScript? You will need a computer running Windows 95, 98, NT 4.0, 2000, Me, or XP and a copy of DecisionScript Author. The Author software includes everything you will need to develop and test DecisionScript applications, including a personal version of the DecisionScript Server software. What do I need to put DecisionScript applications on my web site? If an ISP is hosting your site, you will need access to a DecisionScript-capable server through your ISP or a third party. If your ISP does not yet support DecisionScript, Vanguard can host the DecisionScript portion of your web site. Call us at for details. If you have your own server, you will need a copy of the DecisionScript Server software. The computer that runs DecisionScript Server does not need to be your primary web server and does not need to have any other server software installed. The DecisionScript Server is a complete, stand-alone server that can host your entire site or it can be used in conjunction with any other server software you are currently using. Can I use DecisionScript if my server is UNIX-based? Yes. However, you will need to install DecisionScript Server on a separate computer that is running Windows. Isolating DecisionScript traffic on a computer that is separate from your primary server is a good idea no matter what operating system you are using. This allows you to prevent CPU-intensive applications, which you can choose to build using DecisionScript, from impacting the responsiveness of your primary server. Your web site visitors will not know that portions of a page they are viewing are coming from different computers. How much traffic can DecisionScript handle? A single server (1GHz, 1GB RAM) can handle about 1000 users simultaneously. Since DecisionScript Server is designed to allow you to chain together as many server computers as you need, there is no real limit to the number of users you can handle. Features DecisionScript Author Visual development environment Integrated WYSIWYG HTML editor Extended JavaScript programming Interactive Debugger Point-and-click script building Application development Wizards Rich function library Code re-use Rapid prototyping Integrated spelling checker OLE client and server DecisionScript Server Stand-alone HTTP server Multi-thread execution CGI support ODBC database connectivity True session processing (variable and process state) Persistent sessions across multiple visits Server clustering Data entry validation Dynamic graph construction 100% dynamic page generation Activity monitors Compatible with all Web server software Compatible with all Web browsers Decision-making Methods Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) Decision tree analysis Rule-based expert systems What-if analysis Analytic Methods Simplex optimization Monte Carlo simulation Forecasting Statistical analysis Regression Financial library Numeric calculus Matrix math List processing User-defined function libraries

to learn more contact us at 1-800-538-8173 or visit our web site at www.vanguardsw.

6 to learn more contact us at or visit our web site at To use DecisionScript you need: Personal computer with a 386 or higher microprocessor Microsoft Windows 95, 98, NT 4.0, 2000, Me, XP or later operating system 32 MB of memory Hard disk with at least 10 MB of free space CD-ROM drive VGA or higher-resolution video adapter Any mouse supported by Windows Try DecisionScript for 60 days. If you are not completely satisfied with your purchase, return it for a full refund. 60-DAY MONEY-BACK GUARANTEE

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