Stephanes notes were very thorough. The following are mostly additional information and clarifications:

• Most of the Rahal building is wired with twisted pair. The exception to this is the garage area, where no wiring currently exists, though there are conduits where phone wires are running, so theres the potential to add network wiring fairly easily.
• The Rahal custom system Stephane refers to is a custom-built system by a company called Reynolds & Reynolds. The system was running on a box with a Reynolds & Reynolds logo on it, but it looked suspiciously like an SGI case, so its likely UNIX-based.
• Their IT system also included a standalone word processor, which they said they used mainly as a typewriter.

• The following list gives a broader description of some of the modules in VISTA that Stephane listed:
• Vehicle locator: Search all MB dealers in various regions to locate a NEW car meeting certain criteria
• Vehicle inquiry: Inquire on the status of a previous order (returns "in production", "on boat", etc.)
• DDR: Used to reports sales to MBNA.
• TOPS: Used to place orders with MBNA, both for specific customer orders and for inventory orders
• Pre-Owned: Similar to vehicle locator, but for used cars
• MSRP: Allows dealer to access factory sticker price information on cars
• Dealer Directory: Contact information for dealerships around the country
• Users received no training on the VISTA system aside from a manual. VISTA has a help system that is similar to the one used in many Windows applications.
• The VISTA system is installed on one machine in the dealership currently, but the information available within it is potentially interesting to all the sales people at Rahal. The user we interviewed noted that while she was the main user of VISTA, salespeople often use the system themselves when shes not there.
• The user liked the fact that VISTA was easy to use.
• The user noted that she didnt often use the online Dealer Directory available in VISTA. Instead, she preferred using a paper copy, which allowed her to make notes on the different dealers (who she talked to, how she was treated, etc.)

In addition to the question list posted to the bboard, I asked the following of the System Administrator:

1. Who decided which users get access to which portions of the system?
2. Are there any heavy load times on your network where you notice a bottleneck?
3. What is the bandwidth of your internal network?
4. How easy is it to add machines to your internal network? Is the whole building wired?