[comp.sys.transputer] Microport UNIX

rob@bashfull.UUCP (Rob Savoye) (06/14/88)

 At the UNIX expo last fall I talked to the engineer that did the UNIX port fo
 Microport. It was done by Renishaw Controls, a British process-controls
 company ( among other things ). They originally used PC's running Microport
 V/AT as a master station for industrial controllers and such. Since the AT
 was too slow and they're around the corner from INMOS, they ported UNIX to a
 B004 first, then a B008. This gave them almost real-time speed from UNIX
 while allowing them a good base to port their code from the AT to the B008.
 They also wrote or bought (I think they wrote it) the C compiler that Meiko
 uses. Each transputer runs as a client to a main UNIX "host" rather than a
 distributed kernel approach. It has full access to the PC's graphics at quite
 good speeds. As of last year they hadn't ported any of UNIX's development
 tools to the B008 but I imagine that wouldn't be too difficult. All in all,
 it looked like a nice product, but I'd rather use Trollius. (Trillium)

Rob Savoye
Topologix, Inc.
4860 Ward Rd.
Denver, CO 80033
uucp: ..!hao!boulder!snowwhite!bashfull!rob