sru@cs.exeter.ac.uk (Steve Rush) (01/22/89)
Dear Net, Over here in England, we are all hooked on the Transputer and it seems to have been adopted by several other European establishments. At present however there appears to be very little happening over there in the U.S of A. Are you all being terribly quiet or has the Transputer simply not taken off yet? Does anybody have a list of American Universities/Companies using Transputers? If not, how about one person from each institution (just one from each institution please, I don't want to be flamed for clogging up the net) posting an article saying where you are, what you are doing (a list of recent transputer based papers/reports would be ideal), what languages you use and how you see Transputers being used over the next few years (do you expect to stick with them or are you going to switch to something else etc ?) I'm sorry if I appear nosey but I would just like to know what is happening over there in the U.S. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- S.Rush JANET : sru@uk.ac.exeter.cs Computer Science Dept. UUCP : ukc!expya!sru Exeter University Exeter EX4 4PT England
gdburns@TBAG.OSC.EDU (Greg Burns) (01/25/89)
>From what I've seen over the last three years, there are a whole lot of
people using transputers in the USA. I'm quite sure that the list of
companies and universities is enormous. Perhaps the basic difference
between here and Europe is that the transputer is not a folk hero and/or
state religion in the States. Also, I don't think we talk amongst ourselves
all that much here (we do have NATUG) and thus, you don't overhear the chatter
in Europe. We have very decent Unix and PC based vendors here and
American universities have definitely caught on to the fact that transputers
are a convenient vehicle for research in parallel processing.
-----------------------
Greg Burns gdburns@tbag.osc.edu
Trillium Diving Team (614) 292-8492
Office of Research Computing The Ohio State Universitymotteler@umbc3.UMBC.EDU (Howard E. Motteler) (01/25/89)
In article <870@expya.cs.exeter.ac.uk> sru@cs.exeter.ac.uk (Steve Rush) writes: >Dear Net, > > Over here in England, we are all hooked on the Transputer . . . > > . . . If not, how about one person from each institution . . . > . . . posting an article saying where you are, what you >are doing (a list of recent transputer based papers/reports would be >ideal), what languages you use and how you see Transputers being >used over the next few years (do you expect to stick with them or are >you going to switch to something else etc ?) Here at UMBC, I'm teaching a senior level class called "Parallel Programming in occam," which seems to be gaining in popularity. We have several B004 cards in AT clones, connected to B003's, and also are running occam under VMS. As far as transputer oriented research, I'm interested in trying parallel graph reduction for the lambda or combinator calculus, but am still doing background reading. (Hindly & Seldin, Peyton Jones, etc.) Howard Motteler
darel@sparkles.dcss.mcmaster.ca (Darel Mesher) (01/26/89)
In article <870@expya.cs.exeter.ac.uk> sru@cs.exeter.ac.uk (Steve Rush) writes: >Dear Net, > > Over here in England, we are all hooked on the Transputer and it >seems to have been adopted by several other European establishments. >At present however there appears to be very little happening over >there in the U.S of A. Are you all being terribly quiet or has the >Transputer simply not taken off yet? > I don't know specifically of the research thrusts in the States but I can comment on the transputer history here at McMaster... About three years ago the Computer Science and Systems department decided to investigate the much acclaimed Inmos Transputer, so they carefully allocated the research money required to purchase a development board from the much sought after and carefully guarded research accounts. After several months of eager anticipation the only local Inmos sales office (and I think the only one in Canada) finally delivered our B004 board, with firm promises to promptly follow up with the 'C' compiler we ordered. More weeks passed and after experimentation with TDS and OCCAM (the folding editor is indeed slick) for which there are no low level routines for basic I/O and other standard library functions, the compiler arrived. Examination of the compiler revealed that in fact it was a 'Pre-Production' BETA release with cover notes to the effect that "Although this product is a full implementation of the K&R C definition, it is extremely inefficient". Well, the people who had heard the 10-MIP performance claims made by Inmos for the T414 began to arrive, with 'C' benchmarks in hand to evaluate the system. Needless to say, the B004 with the BETA compiler clocked performances lower than a PC/AT class machine with an 80287. Interest in the transputer diminished to a point where only a handfull in the department considered the system anything other than another overated architecture. Attempts at updating from the 'Pre-Production' compiler were unfruitful with the Canadian distributors showing no interest. The system sat dormant with the exception of limited use for an undergraduate architecture course laboratory. Perhaps the most disheartening aspect of our involvement came after one of the university's professors returned from sabbatical in the UK expounding the virtues of Transputers with stories of donated software, complete support, free updates leading to mature production versions of the dreaded C compiler;- which by the way was not updated by the sole Canadian distributor. When the possibility of purchasing any other language compilers or updates directly from the UK is brought up for discussion, the purse strings are drawn tightly :- proving the adage "Once bitten, twice shy!" Perhaps the recent buy out of Inmos will produce better marketing and support here in North America, but until things change there is little hope of exploratory hardware/software purchases by anyone who has had dealings with the old support philosophy. Darel. -- Darel Mesher ...!uunet!mnetor!maccs!darel McMaster University darel@maccs.mcmaster.ca