[comp.sys.transputer] Transputer and networking

lr@cs.brown.edu (Luigi Rizzo) (03/15/91)

Does anyone know about commercial/prototype systems that allow
Transputer network to communicate via TCP/IP ? As far as I know
the standard TDS protocols (AFSERVER and ISERVER) from Inmos do
not offer such a possibility, even when Unix machines are used as
a host. I know that there was an Inmos Ethernet board that only
supported UDP, not TCP. However, I have no knowledge of non-Inmos
products.

References to commercial products and research papers will be
appreciated. I'll summarize replies.

	Thanks
	Luigi

davidb@brac.inmos.co.uk (David Boreham) (03/18/91)

In article <68608@brunix.UUCP> lr@cs.brown.edu (Luigi Rizzo) writes:
>Does anyone know about commercial/prototype systems that allow
>Transputer network to communicate via TCP/IP ? As far as I know
>the standard TDS protocols (AFSERVER and ISERVER) from Inmos do
>not offer such a possibility, even when Unix machines are used as
>a host. I know that there was an Inmos Ethernet board that only
>supported UDP, not TCP. However, I have no knowledge of non-Inmos
>products.

The ISERVER *does* now offer such a possibility. There is an INMOS
product called the IMS B300 which is a box you connect to your
ethernet and has four link/subsystem ports. The B300 runs TCP/IP
and communicates with ISERVERs running on your host machine.

Hosts supported include SUN, VAX/VMS and PC-DOS. It is pretty
easy to port the host software, so long as you have a BSD socket
library.

For those interested in going beyond the ISERVER, there is a 
transpter socket library which allows transputer applications
to use TCP/IP directly.

Elements of the B300, such as the IMS B018/IMS B431 hardware
and the software in ROM will be sold separately. 

..
IMS B300 goes on beta site testing in ten days time.

...End of advert...contact a sales office for more info.

David.
David Boreham, INMOS Limited | mail(uk): davidb@inmos.co.uk or ukc!inmos!davidb
Bristol,  England            |     (us): uunet!inmos.com!davidb
+44 454 616616 ex 547        | Internet: davidb@inmos.com

cca04@seq1.keele.ac.uk (P.J. Mitchell) (03/18/91)

From article <68608@brunix.UUCP>, by lr@cs.brown.edu (Luigi Rizzo):
> Does anyone know about commercial/prototype systems that allow
> Transputer network to communicate via TCP/IP ? As far as I know
> [...]

I am only familliar with Meiko's CSTools software, but this does allow
compilation of programs to run on transputers and Sun hosts and to
all communicate using the same calls. Meiko provide both a transputer
and a Sun version of the appropriate libraries.

The transputer and Sun binaries can then all be run in the same job and
communicate as if they were all transputer programs (apart from the
byte order problems, handled by XDR routines).

I hope this helps.
-- 
Paul Mitchell (CMA#86(18) MAG#65715 DoD#0145)  | Physics Department,
JANET:  p.j.mitchell@uk.ac.keele.seq1          | Keele University, Keele,
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