Conference heron::euro_swas_ai

307.0. "FWD: MCC Systems Report" by ULYSSE::ROACH (TANSTAAFL !) Tue Mar 26 1991 12:05

 

                  I N T E R O F F I C E   M E M O R A N D U M

                                        Date:     05-Mar-1991 00:16am CET
                                        From:     BEANE
                                                  BEANE@BIGRED@MRGATE@DPD03@DPD
                                        Dept:      
                                        Tel No:    

TO: See Below

Subject: FWD: MCC Systems Report


MCC Systems Technology Report                                 INTERNAL USE ONLY
*****************************
February 28, 1991                                                  (179 lines)

Prepared by Bill Kuhlman and Ralph Cherubini,  Austin, TX


This newsletter covers the work in the Object-Oriented and Distributed Systems 
(OODS) lab within MCC's Advanced Computing Technology (ACT) Program and the 
Deductive Computing Lab within the Software Technology Program (STP).  Please 
feel free to forward it within Digital.  Address inquiries concerning Deductive 
Computing projects to AUSTIN::CHERUBINI; OODS projects to AUSTIN::KUHLMAN.



OODS (Carnot)
============= 
Technical Seminar on Carnot at ZKO - March 13, 1991
---------------------------------------------------
Dr. Phillip Cannata, Director of the Carnot project, will present a technical
seminar series talk Wednesday, March 13, from 9:00-11:00 a.m., in the Babbage 
auditorium, ZKO, Spit Brook Rd., Nashua.  The talk is titled  "Enterprise-Wide 
Information Management:  The Carnot Project at MCC".  All are invited. 

Irresistible Interoperability
-----------------------------
Phil Cannata has written a paper titled "The Irresistible Move towards
Interoperable Database Systems" to be presented as an invited paper at the
Frist International Workshop on Interoperability in Multidatabase Systems,
Kyoto, Japan, April 7-9, 1991.  For an on-line copy (315 lines) send mail to 
AUSTIN::KUHLMAN.


Carnot Progress
---------------
Distributed Transaction Environment via Rosette
----------------------------------------------- 
Several significant additions were made to the Rosette system in support of the 
requirements of the transaction services layer.  First, a general mechanism 
based on Linda tuple spaces was added to support broadcast, virtual synchrony, 
and (eventually) robust broadcast. This is intended to support various kinds of 
transactions which may involve replicated objects or require multiple objects 
to be aware of some message.  Second, The ASN.1 type system was implemented 
permitting a declarative specification of the data structures involved in an 
OSI service protocol.  This facility in conjunction with the implementation of 
the Remote Operation Notation in Rosette mechanizes everything except the 
specific semantics of using or providing an OSIservice.  Third, facilities 
have been added to the ISODE implementation of the OSI protocol stack so that 
Rosette may act as a responder/provider in a completely asynchronous, 
interrupt driven manner.
 
More work is needed to complete the support of responder facilities and to 
provide for completely asynchronous connection requests.  Additionally, as soon 
as the specifications are obtained from SAG, they will be able to build an 
alternative implementation of the Remote Operation Notation that supports the 
SAG protocol transparently to uses of the protocol.This should be a further 
demonstration of the utility of the Rosette approach as an extension/shell 
language.
 
Graphical User Interface via HITS
---------------------------------
Work progressed on the implementation of the Carnot Graphical Interaction 
Environment (GIE) which is based on HKE work done in MCC's human interface lab.
HKE is a knowledge editing tool that embodies an approach to the design of
cooperative computer systems.  An MCC technical report contains the text of a
U.T. dissertation that describes the HKE work:  ACT-AI-048-91 "Person-Computer
Cooperation Through Collaborative Manipulation" by L. Terveen.
 
The basic data browsing capability of the GIE is currently running on a SUN 
with the Itasca database and a Motif-based GUI. 

The goal of the semantically-based graphical language effort is to develop 
grammar and parsing technologies to interpret and generate spatially structured 
objects.  Within GIE, these technologies will enable the sketched design of 
database schemas, database editing with mouse or stylus gestures, and the 
automatic generation of visualizations for data display.
 
Work has also begun on porting Guided Assistance for Data Modification into the 
Graphical Interaction Environment.  This will allow for structured support for 
users as they create, develop, and modify database entries.
 
Semantic Integration via CYC:
----------------------------- 
In work on representation of databases in CYC, they have developed a metaschema 
in CYC for the object-oriented data model, and have used it to do the 
preintegration of an object-oriented database, currently represented and 
running in Itasca's Orion OODBMS.

A collaborative research effort is being initialed with Pacific Bell that will 
further develop techniques for information resource integration and enterprise 
modeling.
 
Interoperability via RDA
------------------------ 
The RDA operations and type definitions have been translated from the ASN1 
format to the Rosette format, and successfully interpreted by Rosette.  Using 
Rosette as the contract invoker, each RDA operation executed is being tested 
against the test base contract manager which validates the arguments received.

Parallel Architecture Tech Report
---------------------------------
  ACT-OODS-058-91  "Scalability of Parallel Algorithms for the All-Pairs Path
    Problem" by Kumar & Singh.  This paper uses the isoefficiency metric to 
    analyze the scalability of several parallel algorithms for finding the
    shortest paths between all pairs of nodes in a densely connected graph.




Deductive Computing
===================
LDL
---
PLEASE NOTE: A comprehensive set of LDL user documentation  will  be  ready  for
shareholders  by the end of March.  In addition to a primer on the LDL language,
the set will contain an in-depth tutorial, developed as part  of  two  tutorials
given   recently   by   the  LDL  group.   This  documentation  should  make  it
more straightforward for Digital application engineers to begin  using  the  LDL
language.  The materials will be available as one or more MCC technical reports.

Members  of  the  DC  group  continue  to  work  on the design documents for the
upcoming  implementation  of  LDL++.   Work  this  month  has  included  testing
translations of LDL code into instructions for the abstract machine for purposes
of verification.

LDL 1.6 has just been released.  This  version  includes  bug  fixes,  interrupt
handler support, and improved error messages.

Brijesh Agarwal of Digital is leaving MCC this month to return to  the  Database
Systems  Research  group  in  Colorado  Springs, after a fruitful stay in the DC
group.

A proposal was submitted to the National Science Foundation for a grant to
support investigation of applications of deductive reasoning to molecular 
biology.

Formal Methods Transition Study
-------------------------------
The  first  large  batch  of  reports generated by the Study should be available
early  in March.  Announcements regarding availability of these materials within
Digital will be made in the March issue of this publication.  The Study 
experiments are underway.

There won't be an MCC Study  newsletter  this  month.   The  next  one  will  be
reproduced here next month, and will feature recent developments  in  US  safety
standards,  an  update  on  the  UK  VIPER,  a summary of Study experiments, and
an updated calendar.

Comings and Goings
==================
Rob Smith, Director of MCC's Experimental Systems Lab, visited DECWest
Engineering on February 5 to discuss the Extensible Software Platform (ESP).

Barbara League, from Database Systems Research in Colorado Springs, visited
MCC on February 19 to evaluate the Carnot project.  Contact SANCHE::League
for her report.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
				OVERVIEW
If you have suggestions for getting MCC technology into Digital or want to be 
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MCC technical reports are available through the Digital Library System or by
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Subscribe by sending mail to AUSTIN::KUHLMAN.  Monthly reports from the MCC 
Experimental Systems (ES Kit) project are posted in the VAX Notes conference 
RDVAX::MCC-ES-KIT.

MCC is a cooperative enterprise whose mission is to strengthen and sustain U.S.
and Canadian competitiveness in information technologies.  The objective is
excellence in meeting broad industry needs through application-driven research,
development and timely deployment of innovative technology.  The ACT (Advanced
Computing Technology) program mission is to anticipate and fulfill requirements
for computer systems technology that is five to ten years in advance of the
state-of-the-art, while maintaining a balanced R&D portfolio that provides
participants with continuing technology leadership.  The theme of user-friendly,
distributed, heterogeneous systems is the basis for ACT's next five year vision.


Distribution:

TO:  Pat Roach@VBE
TO:  Susan Sugar@MWO
TO:  Steve Becker@AQO
TO:  Ed Hurry@DVO
TO:  SHIRLEY CRIDER@DVO
TO:  STEVE DONOVAN@DLO
TO:  DENNIS DICKERSON@DLO
TO:  Gale Kleinberger@HSO
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TO:  Sherry Williams@HSO
TO:  Katherine Jones@HSO
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TO:  Tommy Gaut@HSO
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TO:  jim rather@HSO