Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!tektronix!tekecs!frip!andrew From: andrew@frip.gwd.tek.com (Andrew Klossner) Newsgroups: comp.arch Subject: ABIs for new chips (was Re: DECstation 3100 info.) Message-ID: <10887@tekecs.TEK.COM> Date: 17 Jan 89 20:58:57 GMT References: <558@oracle.UUCP> Sender: andrew@tekecs.TEK.COM Organization: Tektronix, Wilsonville, Oregon Lines: 46 Paul Vixie ("If any of my words above are quoted, please include this paragraph") said: "Even if they had ABI's in mind, could they have agreed? Would they have let OSF or MIPSCO mediate? Binding arbitration among competitors? I'll believe it when I see it. I'd love to see it, of course, but I'd be careful about threatening to hold my breath until it happens. "I applaud the 88000 people. It may well be the first counter-example to what I asserted above about competitors being polite to each other." It happened with the 88k. A dozen or so competitors got together, through membership in the "88k Consortium," and defined a "Binary Compatibility Standard" which will become an ABI when AT&T says the magic words. We have de-facto binary compatibility across the architecture. The result is a design-by-committee, with lots of compromises ... but it's really sort of amazing that it happened at all. Motorola didn't play a big role in the committee, either; three or four key OEMs (some of whom have not publicly announced their role) provided the leadership. "So far the marketing (and an ABI is _marketing_, folks!) of the 88000 has been fantastic." An ABI is marketing in the same sense that a fast FPU is marketing. An ABI is product engineering when you can buy shrink-wrapped 88k binaries from a software vendor that don't specifically say "for the Frobozz Magic Workstation" and install and run them. Several independent software vendors (again, some of whom are unannounced) are preparing 88k ports. "But the 88000 is not yet taking the world by storm, while the MIPSCO chip _is_." Perhaps the storm will happen when some 88k-based systems begin to ship. (I hope!) In the meantime, I applaud the MIPS product; it's the one to (try to) beat. Disclaimer: I earn my salary these days from an 88k project, so I'm biased. -=- Andrew Klossner (uunet!tektronix!hammer!frip!andrew) [UUCP] (andrew%frip.gwd.tek.com@relay.cs.net) [ARPA]