Xref: utzoo comp.misc:6485 comp.os.misc:950 comp.arch:10495 Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!mailrus!uflorida!haven!h.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu!a.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu!jdm From: jdm@a.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu (James D Mooney) Newsgroups: comp.misc,comp.os.misc,comp.arch Subject: TRON (message from the project leader) Keywords: TRON, standards, operating systems, distributed systems Message-ID: <389@h.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu> Date: 5 Jul 89 15:16:22 GMT Sender: news@h.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu Lines: 118 I have been following with great interest the continuing discussion on TRON, although I have been away for the last ten days. Thanks to all who posted comments or provided them by mail. I have tried to reply to any questions, and will continue to do so. A summary will be posted shortly. I have sent copies of the comments to the TRON Association. Dr. Ken Sakamura, TRON Project Leader, has asked me to post the following response. The message from Dr. Sakamura included the following header lines: --From: Ken SAKAMURA --Return-Path: I am no expert on e-mail addresses, especially to Japan, but anyone wishing to reply directly to Dr. Sakamura could try these addresses. Alternately, send your reply to me and I will forward it somehow. MESSAGE FROM DR. KEN SAKAMURA: ----------------------------------------------------------------- Dear Colleagues, I understand that Dr. Mooney's questionnaire produced a flurry of postings on the TRON project. As the leader of the project, I am delighted to hear frank opinions on the project from many people. However, I also noticed that the TRON project is not widely known at least in the USA. If you can spare some time, reading the following articles/books gets you enough knowledge to discuss the topics on the TRON project in a constructive mannner. Sakamura, Ken (ed). IEEE MICRO Special issue on TRON. Vol 7, No. 2, April 1987. Sakamura, Ken (ed.) TRON Project 1987: Open-Architecture Computer Systems (Proceedings of the Third TRON Project Symposium) Springer-Verlag, Tokyo, 1987 Sakamura, Ken (ed.) IEEE MICRO special issue on the 32-Bit Microprocessor in Japan. Vol. 8, No. 2, April 1988. Sakamura, Ken (ed.) TRON Project 1988: Open-Architecture Computer Systems (Proceedings of the Fifth TRON Project Symposium) Springer-Verlag, Tokyo, 1988 Sakamura, Ken, and Sprague, Richard. The TRON Project. BYTE, Vol 14, No. 4, April 1989, pp. 292-301. Sakamura, Ken (ed) IEEE MICRO Special Far East issue. Vol. 9, No. 3, June 1989. I understand that our efforts to publicize the result of the TRON project leave much to be desired. Also detailed specifications are made available only after they reach the final stage of design. During the design phase, the members of the TRON associations are the ones who discusses the pros and cons of the intermediate designs. Since there are more than 100 companies including companies from the U.S.A., our efforts to disseminate the information are focused to the members of the TRON Association. I understand that there are many opinions as to the details of the specifications. We already have a diversity of opinions from the TRON association memebers. Let me just point out that one of the major targets of the TRON project is to standardize computer interfaces of the electronic appliances that have much influence on our everyday life. I can't speak for the U.S.A., but at least in Japan many home appliances have built-in microprocessors, and the trend to incoporate computers will continue. The power of microprocessors makes home appliances perform many fancy things, but some of these become too difficult for ordinary men and women to use. The best way to solve this problem is to let the computers offer better human-machine interfaces. Of course, we don't want to use additional separate computers, but the built-in computers should support such interfaces. Such interfaces must handle somewhat complex operations other than simple turning on/off switches. Standardization of such interfaces is the only way to have a comprehensive home automation that allows us to use many computer-controlled objects in a harmonious way. Regarding the large number of wires in the TRON house reported in a segment of the CNN program, I should mention that the TRON house reported is an experimental one and we intentionally incoporated many wires that should have been invisible. (We will use better technology to route sensor signals, and other control signals in real TRON houses in the future.) That is why there are so many visible wires today in the TRON house. It is certainly shocking, isn't it? By the way, the enhanced capability of the home appliances and houses are not meant to improve the conditions of people in general only. We have already paid close attention to the way these computer controlled objects may help the handicapped and the old. Such considerations are very important when the birth rate in industrialized countries has begun dropping. My guess is that the first encounter of many people in the U.S.A with products based on the TRON specification will be in the home, through computer-controlled home appliances. Regards, Ken Sakamura. ____________________________________ END OF MESSAGE FROM DR. KEN SAKAMURA Jim Mooney Dept. of Stat. & Computer Science (304) 293-3607 West Virginia University Morgantown, WV 26506 INTERNET: jdm@a.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu