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From: paulf@panic.Eng.Sun.COM (Paul Fronberg [CONTRACTOR])
Newsgroups: ba.seminars,comp.windows.x.apps,comp.unix.programmer,comp.windows.misc,comp.windows.ms.programmer,comp.os.ms-windows.programmer.tools,comp.unix.misc,comp.unix.solaris,comp.os.linux.misc,comp.os.386bsd.misc
Subject: SVNet meeting Nov 16: Net Alive: Visual Design of Network Apps
Followup-To: poster
Date: 11 Nov 1994 03:43:39 GMT
Organization: Sun Microsystems Inc., Mountain View, CA
Lines: 112
Distribution: ba
Message-ID: <39up9b$d5n@engnews2.Eng.Sun.COM>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panic.eng.sun.com
Keywords: networking, tools, oop, unix, gui, programming
** SVNet Meeting, November 16, 1994 7:30pm, Mountain View **
SVNet is a SF Bay area UNIX and Open Systems user's group which sponsors
technical presentations at its monthly meetings. The meetings are free
and open to the public. The next presentation will be:
WHAT: Net Alive!: Visual Design of Network Applications
The technology mainstream is shifting from single
computers to computer networks. Applications are
being expected to use the whole network as a single
resource. Likewise, tools are being expected to
develop applications for the whole network -- but
with all the polish and flexibility developers have
been accustomed to on single computers.
The presentation will focus on Net Alive!, a network
application development system which permits development
in an integrated environment. The user specifies appearance
(GUI) and function as a single entity and in a single
operation. Thereafter, installation, execution, and
maintenance are handled automatically by the system.
We represent an entire network application by an
Intertask. An Intertask is an object (or file or
data set) that contains the appearance (GUI), code,
and libraries (if applicable) for all the computers
in a network application. Furthermore, code is
represented in an instruction-set independent form
(such as C++ source code or a shell script).
The operator constructs an Intertask visually. Icons
with code or GUI widgets get allocated on a 2-d
surface with drag-and-drop. The mouse connects icons
with lines representing data flow. The appearance of
GUI widgets may be fine-tuned with the mouse for
aesthetic appearance. At this level, an Intertask
may be constructed without programming.
Each icon may have an address. An address causes an
icon to run on the specified computer (or computers)
and for all input and output data to be sent to and
from that computer. To support a wide range of
applications, addresses may specify one or multiple
computers and may be specified as part of the
program or computed at run time. Addresses computed
at run time may change during the execution of a
program.
The properties of an Intertask permit
straightforward execution. Since the same Intertask
applies to all the computers in an application, any
computer may load or install to any other. This
permits a demand-installation procedure. Whenever
one computer contacts a another, it first checks to
see if the Intertask is present. If not, it is
supplied by the first computer. This gives the user
the appearance that every application is installed
on every computer (subject to security). Since an
Intertask has code in an instruction-set-independent
form, an Intertask can be demand-installed on a
computer of any architecture. The receiving computer
just has to have a compiler and know how to run it.
Taken together, these features let an Intertask be
run and debugged with the same degree of polish as a
single-computer program. The user need only start an
application on one computer to kick off the
automatic procedures for installing and building the
application on all the relevant computers on the
network.
The talk includes a demonstration of the Net Alive!
system on ethernet-connected Windows PCs. The
demonstration involves building a multi-user,
interactive, network application visually by linking
tasks with a GUI. The tasks themselves can be from a
library or created and edited by linking to an
Integrated Development Environment (Visual C++).
WHO: Erik DeBenedictis, Scalable Computing (erikd@ix.netcom.com)
Erik DeBenedictis has a Ph. D. degree from Caltech.
At Caltech, he constructed a parallel computer called
the "Cosmic Cube." Erik was at Bell Laboratories for
5 years and then at startup companies Ansoft and nCUBE.
Erik co-founded Scalable Computing, a computer network
software company, in 1991.
WHEN: Wednesday, November 16, 1994 at 7:30 pm
WHERE: Sun Microsystems Bldg 6, 2750 Coast Avenue, Mountain View
Coast Ave appears to be just a driveway next to Bldg 5 on Garcia Ave
between Amphitheatre Pkwy and San Antonio, so don't get confused.
-------------------------
For more information, please call either Paul Fronberg at (415) 366-6403
or Ralph Barker at (408) 559-6202.
SVNet is a UNIX and open systems user group supported
by member dues and donations.
SVNet Meetings are FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.
UNIX is a registered trademark licensed by X/Open Ltd