Part academic symposium, part sales pitch, the University of California Berkeley's Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) department's annual conference presented some of the department's recent research efforts. Held in conjunction with National Engineers Week, the conference featured three talks that highlighted some of the department's more interesting research -- Richard Newton on "Software on Silicon," Bob Brodersen on "Goals of the New Berkeley Wireless Research Center," and Dave Patterson on "Post-PC Computer Architecture."
Newton focused on the growing productivity gap in integrated circuit design, a major concern at Berkeley's Gigascale Silicon Research Center. The problem is that as Moore's Law continues to hold, the potential capability of chips is growing faster than our ability to design such complex chips. Two possible solutions to this dilemma are to improve existing chip design software and to use programmable, general-purpose microcontrollers rather than application-oriented chips. Newton seems to favor the latter solution, noting that it shifted the complexity from the hardware design to the software. One drawback to this approach, however, is the higher power requirements for programmable chips. According to Newton, there is a four-orders-of-magnitude difference in performance per power between application-oriented and general purpose chips.
Brodersen took the opposite position, saying that with better software design tools, there was no reason why we couldn't overcome the productivity gap in IC design. The focus of Brodersen's talk, however, was not on the difficulties of chip design, but on the formation of the new Berkeley Wireless Research Center. Part of the motivation behind the center came from some of the collaboration difficulties researchers had with the development of Infopad, a wireless, consumer information prototype that was developed jointly by university and industry researchers. One unique aspect of the Center is that all of its work is in the public domain.
Finally, David Patterson discussed IStore, a highly reliable, highly scalable storage system designed to act as the infrastructure for next-generation, portable computing devices. Based on his experiences with RAID and feedback from companies, Patterson realized that several of his previous design assumptions -- such as mechanical disks being the most unreliable part of the storage system, and companies considering cost the highest priority -- were incorrect. One of IStore's many new features is the use of multiple free versions of UNIX, the assumption being that since all of the free versions of UNIX run Linux binaries, if one particular version has a kernel bug that causes it to crash, the other versions will not have that same bug and will continue to run.
-- Eugene Eric Kim
IBM has released (what it claims to be) the world's first desktop PC made from 100 percent recycled plastic resin for all major plastic parts. Contrary to common expectations, the IBM IntelliStation E Pro, which contains 3.5 pounds of plastic, was converted from a prime resin to recycled plastic at no extra cost. In fact, some of the recycled parts actually cost 20 percent less to manufacture. According to an EPA study, approximately 10 percent of the weight content of municipal landfills is plastic waste. For its part, the IntelliStation is built around a 450-/500-MHz Pentium III microprocessor and IBM's Fire GL1 3D graphics acceleration subsystem.
-- Jonathan Erickson
Everything that Microsoft does these days seems to result in public outcry. It's not really surprising: People like to root for the underdog, and Microsoft makes Goliath look like a chihuahua. On the flip side, attacking Microsoft is an easy way to detract attention from yourself and win public support, and on occasion, Microsoft is unfairly victimized.
Five years ago, Michael Doyle of Eolas Technologies received U.S. Patent 5,838,906, entitled, "Distributed hypermedia method for automatically invoking external application providing interaction and display of embedded objects within a hypermedia document." In other words, Doyle was claiming (and was awarded) a patent on Java applets, browser plug-ins, and ActiveX controls.
Predictably, many people expressed outrage, including DDJ editor-in-chief, Jon Erickson, who mentioned the patent in his November 1995 editorial. Doyle responded in a letter to DDJ:
We are not asking browser companies to pay royalties for developing browsers that can run applets. Rather, we are only requiring that they adhere to a standard "Web-API" that will be defined by a consortium of Eolas licensees. This will accelerate the rapid pace of interactive application development on the Web, not hinder it.
Regardless of how misguided Doyle's actions were, at least he seemed to have good intentions.
In February, 1999, Eolas quietly announced that it was suing Microsoft for patent infringement, asking for unspecified damages and an injunction forcing Microsoft to cease manufacture of Internet Explorer. For legal reasons, Doyle refused comment on the suit, but it's a safe bet that Eolas is not simply "encouraging" Microsoft to conform to Eolas's Weblet API.
-- Eugene Eric Kim
The yet-to-be released Open Service Gateway Specification is being touted as the industry's first open interface for connecting consumer and small business appliances with Internet services. Backed by a consortium that includes Alcatel, Cable & Wireless, Electriciti de France, Enron Communications, Ericsson, IBM, Lucent, Motorola, Network Computer, Nortel Networks, Oracle, Philips, Sun, Sybase, and Toshiba, the spec's Java-based environment will provide a common foundation for ISPs, network operators, and equipment manufacturers to deliver a wide range of Internet services to enable the consolidation and management of voice, data, and multimedia communications to and from home. The specification will also be designed to provide secure wireless or wired links between high-value home services -- such as security, energy management, emergency healthcare, and electronic commerce services -- and the computer systems of external computer networks and ISPs. The specification, which is due for release in mid-1999, will consist of application framework and resource management, client APIs for thin and fat WANs, device APIs for LANs, security and integrity APIs, and data management APIs for database integration administration. For more information, see http://www.osgi.org/.
-- Jonathan Erickson