CORK@cs.umass.edu (Dan Corkill, COINS, UMass 413/545-0156) (06/01/89)
For the record, here is the official ``scoop'' on GBB and availability information on obtaining the GBB software from UMass. (The full GBB system involves nearly 1MByte of source code, so plan accordingly.) Rumor also has it that a commercial offering of a substantially enhanced GBB product and support services will be announced this summer. -- Dan ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ GBB: A Generic Blackboard Development System August 1988 GENERAL INFORMATION The Generic Blackboard Development System (GBB) is a development tool for constructing high-performance blackboard-based systems. GBB provides speed and flexibility in implementing an application as well as efficient execution of the resulting application. GBB views the blackboard as a hierarchical forest of nested blackboards. Blackboard objects reside in spaces, which are the leaves of this hierarchy. Each space can be defined as a highly structured, n-dimensional volume, with blackboard objects occupying some extent within the space. Efficient insertion and retrieval of blackboard objects is achieved using a language specifying the dimensional structure of each space and a separate specification of how that space is to be implemented. These specifications are combined to generate a highly-tuned blackboard database kernel tailored to the application. GBB V2.1 contains four distinct subsystems: 1. A high-level blackboard database compiler and runtime support system. 2. A set of knowledge source (KS) shells for situations where native Common Lisp is unsuitable. (Currently only an OPS5 KS shell is available.) 3. A growing set of generic control shells. 4. A graphic display subsystem for examining the blackboard. (The graphic display subsystem is currently available only for Texas Instruments Explorer workstations.) GBB was begun late in 1985, and is available to AI researchers. GBB remains under active development, with major development efforts underway on both distributed and shared-memory, parallel blackboard architectures. To date, the following papers have been written discussing GBB: Daniel D. Corkill, Kevin Q. Gallagher, and Kelly E. Murray. "GBB: A generic blackboard development system." In Proceedings of the National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pages 1008-1014, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, August 1986. (Also in Blackboard Systems, Robert S. Engelmore and Anthony Morgan, editors, pages 503-518, Addison-Wesley, 1988. Also published as Technical Report 86-67, Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, April 1986.) Daniel D. Corkill, Kevin Q. Gallagher, and Philip M. Johnson. "From Prototype to Product: Evolutionary Development within the Blackboard Paradigm." Technical Report 86-46, Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, October 1986. (Presented at Workshop on High Level Tools for Knowledge Based Systems, Columbus, Ohio, October 7-8, 1986.) Daniel D. Corkill, Kevin Q. Gallagher, and Philip M. Johnson. "Achieving flexibility, efficiency, and generality in blackboard architectures." In Proceedings of the National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pages 18-23, Seattle, Washington, July 1987. (Also in Readings in Distributed Artificial Intelligence, Alan Bond and Les Gasser, editors, pages 451-456, Morgan Kaufmann, 1988. Also published as Technical Report 87-37, Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, April 1987.) Philip M. Johnson, Daniel D. Corkill, and Kevin Q. Gallagher. "Integrating BB1-Style Control into the Generic Blackboard System." Technical Report 87-59, Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, June 1987. (Presented at the AAAI-87 Blackboard Workshop, Seattle, Washington, July 13, 1987.) Daniel D. Corkill and Kevin Q. Gallagher. "Tuning a blackboard-based application: A case study using GBB." In Proceedings of the National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pages 671-676, St. Paul, Minnesota, August 1988. (Also published as Technical Report 88-37, Department of Computer and Information Science,University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, April 1988.) Daniel D. Corkill. "Design alternatives for parallel and distributed blackboard systems." Technical Report 88-38, Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, August 1988. (Presented at the AAAI-88 Blackboard Workshop, St. Paul, Minnesota, August 24,1988.) Kevin Q. Gallagher, Daniel D. Corkill, and Philip M. Johnson. "GBB Reference Manual." Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, GBB Version 1.2 edition, September 1988. (Published as Technical Report 88-66, Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, September 1988.) Kevin Q. Gallagher and Daniel D. Corkill. "Blackboard retrieval strategies in GBB." Technical Report 88-39, Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, November 1988. Support for GBB is provided, in part, by the following sources: - Donations from Texas Instruments, Incorporated; - NSF CER grant DCR-8500332; - ONR URI contract N00014-86-K-0764. Additional support for GBB is provided by members of the GBB Consortium. Consortium membership inquiries should be directed to the address below. AVAILABILITY To receive a copy of GBB, return the order form at this end of this message. (GBB can also be obtained via anonymous FTP. To receive FTP instructions, send a request to GBB-Request@CS.UMass.Edu.) GBB is available without cost, and is provided with the following understanding: 1. Title and copyright to this software and any material associated therewith shall at all times remain with the Department of Computer and Information Science (COINS) at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. 2. The user acknowledges that the software and associated materials are provided as a research tool that remains under active development and is being supplied "as is" for the purposes of scientific collaboration aimed at further development and application of the software and the exchange of technical data. 3. All software and materials developed as a consequence of the use of this software shall duly acknowledge such use, in accordance with the usual standards of acknowledging credit in academic research. 4. Users of this software agree to make their best efforts to inform the COINS GBB Development Group of noteworthy uses of this software. Users are further encouraged to make themselves known to this group so that new releases, bug fixes, and tutorial information can be distributed as they become available. 5. COINS makes no representations or warranties of the merchantability or fitness of this software for any particular purpose; that uses of the software and associated materials will not infringe any patents, copyrights, trademarks, or other rights; nor that the operation of this software will be error-free. COINS is under no obligation to provide any services, by way of maintenance, update, or otherwise. 6. In conjunction with products or services arising from the use of this material, there shall be no use of the name of the Department of Computer and Information Science or the University of Massachusetts in any advertising, promotional, or sales literature without prior written consent from COINS in each case. GBB is written in Common Lisp and runs on any Common Lisp implementation. GBB uses a few primitives (primarily for interacting with Common Lisp's DEFSTRUCT capabilities) that cannot be efficiently written in generic Common Lisp. For maximum performance, we strongly recommend that these primitives be rewritten for the particular Common Lisp implementation. We supply these optimizations for the following Common Lisp implementations: - Texas Instruments Explorer Lisp machines; - Symbolics Lisp machines; - Digital Equipment Corporation's VaxLisp; - Lucid Common Lisp. Typically, 2-4 programmer hours are required to write the optimizations for a particular Common Lisp implementation. There is an informal GBB electronic mailing list. It is a forum for discussing problems or experiences using GBB as well as announcing new features and updates to GBB. To send a message to the list use the address GBB@CS.Umass.Edu. To be added to the list send mail to GBB-Request@CS.UMass.Edu. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ GBB Order Form Name (Contact Person): _______________________________________________________ Organization: _______________________________________________________ Phone Number: _______________________________________________________ Postal Address: _______________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________ E-mail Address: _______________________________________________________ Tape Format: ____ Explorer Backup Tape ____ Symbolics Carry Tape ____ VMS Backup Tape (9 track, __ 1600 or __ 6250 bpi) ____ Unix Tar Tape (9 track, __ 1600 or __ 6250 bpi) Machine(s): ____ Explorer or micro-Explorer Lisp Workstation ____ Symbolics Lisp workstation ____ Sun (with Sun Common Lisp) ____ VAX (VMS or Ultrix with VaxLisp) ____ Macintosh (with Allegro Common Lisp) ____ Other: __________________________________________ GBB development is supported in part by several U.S. government agencies. It would help us to know if you are using GBB in research directly sponsored by any of the following: ____ Air Force Office of Scientific Research ____ U.S. Army ____ Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency ____ National Aeronautics and Space Administration ____ National Institute of Health ____ National Science Foundation ____ Office of Naval Research ____ Other U.S. Government Agency: ___________________________________ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ To receive a copy of GBB, complete the above form and return it to: GBB Development Group C/O Dr. Daniel D. Corkill Department of Computer and Information Science Lederle Graduate Research Center University of Massachusetts Amherst, Massachusetts 01003 Phone: 413/545-0156 FAX: 413/545-1249 or via E-mail to GBB-Request@CS.UMass.Edu. Installation instructions and one copy of the GBB Reference Manual are included in the distribution kit. We ask that you promptly return the tape media after installing GBB on your system. Prompt return insures that you remain in our good graces regarding future releases of GBB and will allow us to continue our policy of supplying loaner media without charge. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------