Xref: utzoo comp.std.misc:99 comp.realtime:62 comp.arch:10259 comp.os.misc:910 comp.misc:6325
Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!purdue!haven!h.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu!a.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu!jdm
From: jdm@a.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu (James D Mooney)
Newsgroups: comp.std.misc,comp.realtime,comp.arch,comp.os.misc,comp.misc
Subject: TRON (a little long)
Keywords: Japan, TRON, standards, networks, operating systems
Message-ID: <382@h.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu>
Date: 14 Jun 89 15:16:23 GMT
Sender: news@h.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu
Lines: 101



This is a request for opinions (and an offer of information)
about the Japanese TRON project. As a consultant to
Nippon Telegraph and Telephone for their
work on CTRON (a TRON subproject), I seem to be one of very
few Westerners involved with TRON. Some time ago, in answer
to a question that appeared in comp.arch, I posted some basic
information about TRON. As far as I know, there has been *NO*
further discussion of TRON anywhere on the net. Why not?

For a quick summary, TRON is a project started by Dr. Ken Sakamura
at the U. of Tokyo in 1985, and now being carried on in Japan
by an industrial consortium of over 100 companies.  NTT alone
has *hundreds* of people working on it.  Most major Japanese computer
companies and Japanese branches of American companies (IBM, HP, etc)
are members.  Unlike some other Japanese initiatives it is *not*
government-sponsored.

The goal of TRON is to develop a wide-ranging collection of standards
for use in a very comprehensive distributed network -- one which is
globally connected but involves everything from large hosts to
workstations to a multitude of embedded processors in "intelligent
objects" such as the components of a "smart house."  In the TRON
vision, all of these elements could easily communicate, even though
produced by many different manufacturers.

One of the TRON project achievements to date is a standard 32-bit
microprocessor architecture which has been implemented by Hitachi,
Fujitsu, Toshiba, Oki, and others.  Other projects which are
already leading to significant products include a new workstation
user interface standard (BTRON) and an operating system interface
for small realtime systems (ITRON).  The CTRON project, which I
work on, is developing a comprehensivre operating system interface
standard for larger systems with realtime performance requirements
such as network servers.

Whether the TRON standards are good or bad, the project's scale, and
results to date, make it certain that it will have some impact.
Good descriptions of TRON have appeared in special issues of
IEEE MICRO (April 87, April 88) and in BYTE (April 89).  Yet
there seems to be little interest in TRON outside Japan,
at least in the U.S. Now the British Journal Microprocessors and
Microsystems also plans a special issue, and I have been asked to
contribute a short article giving a Western viewpoint
on TRON. What I still don't understand is:

*WHY DOESN'T ANYONE SEEM TO CARE?*

I do have some theories.  Which one do you think is right?

1. It's a Japanese project, not relevant outside Japan.

	(It is wholly Japanese now, but the industry participation
	is comprehensive, association membership is open,
	nothing is proprietary, and international participation
	has been encouraged for some time.)

2. It's not needed; there are enough standards.

	(The areas addressed by many of the TRON projects,
	 especially realtime systems, have no current standards,
	not even de facto ones.)

3.  Only single-company de facto standards (like IBM) are practical.
    Companies won't cooperate.

	(Over a hundred companies in the TRON assoication do not
	agree.  Several versions of the TRON CPU chip, developed
	independently but conforming to the standard, are now on
	the market.  U.S. projects like POSIX and the Open Software
	Foundation show increased concern for open, industry-sponsored
	standards.)

4.  It's interesting, but will have no effect on me.

	(Who among us will not participate in more and more large
	scale (and small scale) networking?  Does it matter what the
	interfaces (of all kinds) are, and what hardware and software
	can easily connect?)

5. There's plenty of discussion of TRON outside Japan; you just have
   missed it all.

	(Please point me in the right direction.)

6. Other?

I welcome all opinions, discussion, or questions.  I hope I
have posted this to the most appropriate newsgroups.  If there
is any interest, I will be glad to post or mail further information
about TRON, and/or summaries of any comments received.  Thanks.

Jim Mooney				Dept. of Stat. & Computer Science
(304) 293-3607				West Virginia University
					Morgantown, WV 26506
INTERNET: jdm@a.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu
Jim Mooney				Dept. of Stat. & Computer Science
(304) 293-3607				West Virginia University
					Morgantown, WV 26506
INTERNET: jdm@a.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu