20 Mar
2007
20 Mar
'07
9:29 p.m.
I have two questions that have interested me a little, and as Johnson
would put it I know neither the answer nor where to go to find the
answer.
(1) What is the history of the crossbar in computer architectures as a
mainbus replacement? All I know of it is when it hit the desktop, and
there it looks like it arrived first in the DEC 3000 AXP (not sure if
this includes the 300 series or not), and then spread around the middle
of the '90s with Sun picking it up as UPA and SGI going whole-hog for
it. I assume it came down from mainframes or supercomputers, possibly a
Control Data design?
(2) What was the UI like on Sun's pre-OpenLook implementation of NeWS
(or was there one?) Did it leverage SunView, or were parts of it
similar to SGIs 4Sight?
21 Mar
21 Mar
2:09 a.m.
Scott Quinn wrote:
(1) What is the history of the crossbar in computer architectures as a
mainbus replacement? All I know of it is when it hit the desktop, and
there it looks like it arrived first in the DEC 3000 AXP (not sure if
this includes the 300 series or not), and then spread around the middle
of the '90s with Sun picking it up as UPA and SGI going whole-hog for
it. I assume it came down from mainframes or supercomputers, possibly a
Control Data design?
I recall reading an article in Annals of the History of Computing about a
late 60's era mainframe in which memory and multiple processors were
connected via some sort of crossbar/matrix switching arrangement.
I think it was a Burroughs machine but my memory could be wrong on that even.
I remember the diagram of the switching arrangement, and have been searching
the IEEE/AotHoC site but I'm not coming up with much. (Unfortunately, search
engines don't help much for graphical memories.)
..Sorry to be so vague, perhaps Chuck or Billy or another who was around then
may recall something more specific.
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