From: raolson@cornflower.wpd.sgi.com (Robert Olson)
Subject: Re: SAS on SGI/MIPS ABI Support
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc.
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 16:11:38 GMT

In article <hhg1-121092090351@132.197.14.85>, hhg1@gte.com (Hal German)
writes:
>>I'm very concerned that the SAS Institute will probably drop support
>>for the SGI in the next year or two. (I've heard nothing definite).
>>SAS Institute told me that the SGI platform could be helped if SGI
>>supported the MIPS ABI standard reducing their development costs.
>>
>>I called SGI tech support and they say it is a marketing issue. I
>>called
>>the marketing number and still awaiting word back.
>>
>>Can anyone at SGI either a)talk to SAS Institute to make sure future
>>releases are supported or b)tell me what is SGI's stand on the MIPS
>>ABI is.


The next major release of IRIX will support the execution of
applications written to the MIPS ABI.  For those unfamiliar with the
MIPS ABI, it is the USL SVR4 Generic ABI (gABI), the USL MIPS Processor
Specific ABI (psABI), and a document created by the MIPS ABI Group
called the MIPS Processor ABI Conformance Guide (Black Book).  This
latter document consists of those features from BSD, future POSIX
standards and other defacto standards which we felt were important for
applications but which have not made it into the gABI or psABI as yet. 
The goal of the MIPS ABI Group is to enable the creation of binary
compatible applications across platforms based on MIPS and SVR4.  There
are about ten platform vendors, including SGI, participating in the
development of the ABI.  Other participants include USL, Oracle and SAS
Institute.  A number of application ports to the ABI are in progress. 
In part to distinguish ourselves from certain other consortia, the MIPS
ABI Group has been keeping a low profile in the end user community until
we can demonstrate interesting applications running on a number of
platforms.  That milestone is in sight, so you should be hearing much
more about it in the not too distant future.

An important thing to note is that not all applications will fit nicely
into the MIPS ABI.  For example, no graphics standards beyond X and
Motif are included.  Obviously, those applications which utilize
Multiprocessing, GL, sound or video for competitive advantage will need
to continue to be platform sensitive.  For many applications there are
ways of structuring things so that platform specific items can be
isolated, giving the application developer many of the advantages of the
ABI.  As features become more standardized we expect to incorporate them
into new versions of the ABI.

In the particular instance of SAS I expect that we will work things out.
In any Independent Software Vendor (ISV) relationship there are many
more issues than just the technical one of whether the application
works.  There are issues of performance tuning, on what terms hardware
will be provided to the ISV, promises of application availability on new
platforms and of new application versions, application certification on
new operating systems and so forth.  Each of these relationships has
some unique qualities.  I don't know the specifics of whatever
contractual relationships exist between SAS Institute and SGI.  I'm
confident that the technical issues are straightforward.  My experience
with the people at SAS is that they will make every effort to make the
technical and business arrangements work out.  However, it's never done
until it's done.

Feel free to email me if you want further information on any of these
topics.  In particular, I'm happy to email a PostScript copy of the
first release of the ABI Conformance Guide.  Pretty boring, nitpicky
stuff, though.  The right place for an ABI novice to start is with the
USL books.  They are published by Prentice Hall and (at least here in
the Bay Area) are available at most bookstores with reasonable technical
sections.  Computer Literacy in San Jose takes phone orders at
408-435-1118.

Newsgroups: comp.sys.sgi