Distributed Systems Laboratory (DSLAB) consists of several research areas, one of which is High Performance Communication Systems (HPCS). The long term goal of the HPCS group is to develop High Speed and Real Time Communication Systems. We are active in three subareas: End Systems, Real time inter networking, and High speed networking. The end system subarea is concerned with protocols and operating systems. The issues include transport protocols, operating system support for real time communication communication, host network interfaces and analysis of the communication requirements of applications. The real time subarea concerns how to deliver real time communication service in an internet style network. The sub-area high speed networking encompasses networking at the medium access level, for example protocols for ATM and DTM, and their switching technologies.
Our primarily role in the project is to contribute with our competence on protocols for high speed networks and on efficient implementation of protocols and how they interact with operating systems and hardware. We will lead the workpackage Execution Environments and contribute to workpackages on Protocol Architecture in the XXIst century and to Application and demonstration.
Another research group at DSLAB work with formal techniques to support the design of protocols, from specification to implementation. This group is active in the BRA project CONCUR2. They may give feedback on the use of formal methods on the project. Another group concentrates on distributed multimedia, including group communication and cooperative work via interactive, packet based, video and distributed Virtual Reality environments. This will strengthen the project plans of anticipated test application, group video conference.
The HPCS researchers at SICS are: Bengt Ahlgren (PhD student), Mats Bjorkman (expected PhD in September 93), Per Gunningberg (PhD), Olof Hagsand (PhD student), Gunnar Karlsson (PhD), Stephen Pink (expected PhD in Spring 93), Peter Sjodin (PhD), Patrik Ernberg (PhD student). Besides the basic funding from SICS we currently have the following research contracts: (1) EUA/PI, supported by Ellemtel, a development company of Ericsson and Swedish Telecom. In the project we study efficient implementation of telecommunication protocols, (2) TPES, supported by Norwegian Telecom, in which we study transport protocols for Desk Area Networks and real time end systems, (3) ProVIA, supported by the Prometheus/SAAB/Volvo in which we designed a real time, predictable communication system. The group arranged (Gunningberg/Pink were chairmen) the 3rd IFIP workshop on Protocols for High Speed Networks, 1992 in Stockholm.
We maintain close working contacts with many European and and international research organizations. Relevant for this project are: University of Arizona, to which one of the group member (Bjorkman) will be a postdoc coming year, Xerox PARC on a collaboration on ATM drivers, Hewlett Packard Labs at Bristol on protocol implementations, IBM Heidelberg and GMD Berkom on protocols for high speed real time networks. We also have close contacts with researchers of the US Gigabit testbeds, Aurora and DARTnet.