draft 0.3

The meeting was called to order by Jing Kwok, DY4 and vice-chair of the VSO. Jing noted that Bob Downing, chair, was unable to attend the meeting. Jing asked the members to introduce themselves and state their company affiliation.

Jing asked members to approve the minutes of the May meeting. Hearing no objection the minutes were approved as written.

The agenda was reviewed. Several changes were made and the agenda was accepted.

Jing stated the VSO early disclosure patent policy and asked for patent disclosures. Jim Botte, Nortel, stated that he had several patents that he wished to disclose for a technology that he was going to introduce as a new standards activity. John Rynearson, VITA, noted that Jim could disclose these patents during his presentation.

Jing asked for announcements.

Cathy Hallam, Spectrum Signal, gave members details on the harbor cruise sponsored by Spectrum Signal and planned for the evening.

Eike Waltz reviewed the status of P1101.11 and annouced the PAR for 1101.1. See attached.

John Rynearson gave a short update on the status of draft standards currently in the ANSI canvass ballot process. See attached summary.

Jerry Braun, CRANE, announced that CRANE was sponsoring a Technology Management Symposium & Expo in Hilton Head Island, SC, November 17-19, 1997 and invited members to submit papers. See attached "Call for Papers".

Ray Alderman, Executive Director of VITA, reported on VITA activities. A special advertising section for VME was coming up in EDN magazine and Ray urged members to take advantage of this opportunity. Ray noted that the recent Mars lander contained an R6000 VME module making VME the first bus on Mars.

Richard Jaenicke, Sky Computer, gave members a report on the status of VITA 10, Skychannel. Craig Lund, Mercury Computer, had raised several concerns regarding the ability of Skychannel to work reliably at 320 Mbytes/second on the P2 backplane. Richard discussed the method used by Sky to achieve reliable operation and invited members to view a demonstration unit that he had set up in the back of the meeting room. The recirculation ballot for VITA 10 will close on July 20, 1997. See attached presentation.

Jim Botte, Nortel, proposed a new activity for standardization called TEMPE. TEMPE stands for Telecommunications and Enterprise Multimedia Platform and Environment. TEMPE is a telco platform that has been developed by Nortel and is targeted for central office and mission critical applications. Standard VMEbus modules are used with specially built injector/extractor faceplates. Jim noted that TEMPE will use VME320 backplane technology. Jim disclosed four patents that cover the technology being proposed for standardization. These patents are:

#5488541 - VMEbus Compatible Backplane and Shelf Arrangement

#5495583 - Voice bus for computer backplane

#5402320 - Electronic Self Keying and Alignment

#5594893 - System for monitoring and processing minutes

Several members have indicated interest in sponsoring this activity. A sign-up list for task group members was circulated. See attachments.

Robert Negre, CETIA, presented work that CETIA had done over the past year putting the PCI bus on the VMEbus P2 connector. He proposed that the group consider PCI on P2, named P2CI, as a new activity. As currently implemented CETIA views P2CI as an alternative to VSB. P2CI will work over six slots. Several members have indicated interest in sponsoring this activity and a sign-up list for task group members was circulated. See attached presentation.

*** BREAK ***

Holly Sherfinski, Harting, gave a short status report on the 160 pin connector. The decision has been made to standardized the connector as part of the IEC 1076-4-xxx family. See attachment.

The VSO meeting was temporarily adjourned by Jing Kwok.

The VME64x task group meeting was called to order by its chair, Wayne Fischer, FORCE Computers. Wayne reported that the VITA 1.1, VME64x has successfully passed the latest task group ballot having easily met the VSO's 75/75 rule. He discussed the comments received. All changes will be incorporated into the next draft and a 14 day recirculation ballot will be held. After reviewing the revised draft standard balloters may change their current ballot or let their current ballot stand. VITA 1.1 is expected to be moved to ANSI canvass ballot by September. See attached ballot summary.

*** LUNCH ***

Lou Francz, Dialogic, and chair of VITA 1.4, Live Insertion for VME64x called the VITA 1.4 task group meeting to order. Several issues were discussed. Lou noted that most of the electrical issues were completed. Outstanding issues for completion include some rudimentary software calls to support live insertion. The latest draft of VITA 1.4 is posted on VITA's VSO web page and can be downloaded in PDF format. See attachment re: board design requirements.

Tony Lavely, Raceway, gave a short report on VITA 5.1. The group is currently working on developing the initial draft.

Holly Sherfinski, Harting, called the VITA 1.6, Keying for Conduction Cooled VME, task group meeting to order. Several issues were discussed. Holly noted that some members felt that the term coding rather than keying should be used in the title. After discussion the members decided to retain the term keying. Holly asked for volunteers for draft editor. Elwood Parsons indicated that he would take the assignment. The VITA 1.6 task group meeting was adjourned. See attachments.

Before beginning the VITA 1.5 task group meeting, Rick O'Connor, Tundra, gave a short presentation on their concept for a virtual PCI bus across VME known as VPCI. Since many VME CPU modules use PCI as a local bus, Tundra has looked at including logic in their interface chip that would allow one module to bridge to another via the VMEbus. Using PCI as a bridge across VME would allow system integrators to take advantage of existing PCI based software. A list was sent around so those interested in VPCI could sign up. See attached presentation and sign-up list.

Jonathan Morris, Tundra, called the 2eSST Protocol task group meeting to order. Jonathan thanked Drew Berding, Arizona Digital, for his help in developing the initial draft of the document which is now available. Jonathan asked for comments. See attached document.

Jing Kwok called the meeting to order. The agenda was reviewed and several changes were made to accommodate presenters who had to leave early.

John Rynearson noted that VITA 19, Busnet, has successfully passed its task group ballot and had met the VSO 75/75 rule. John congratulated Paul Fischer for his efforts as task group chair and asked that VITA 19 be moved to ANSI canvass ballot. John noted that Paul had left his position with FORCE computers and accepted a position with Radisys and that Paul offered to continue to support Busnet through the ANSI ballot process.

Wayne Fischer, FORCE Computers, sent a sign up sheet around soliciting members for the VITA 2, ETL task group ballot.

Hermann Strass, Technology Consulting, reported on a number of issues. Hermann is the technical coordinator for VITA Europe and is also the task group chair for two VITA activities: VITA 11, Autobahn, and VITA 14, CXC/Modpacks.

Hermann noted that VITA 14 successfully passed its task group ballot and was being moved to ANSI canvass ballot. Several members of the task group ballot who were not VSO members, were formally accepted by the VSO-member task group members. VITA 11, Autobahn, did not passed its task group ballot and a new task group ballot will be held.

Hermann discussed some new efforts that were being brought to the VSO. One of these efforts is called Small PMC. It is a mezzanine bus with mechanics similar to IEEE P1386.1. This effort is being sponsored by MEN Electronik.

Hermann noted that he had discussed bringing P2CI to the VSO with Robert Negre, CETIA. Hermann also discussed a number of magazine articles that he had written for the European press. See attachments.

Jim Waggett, CSPI, called the VITA 26 task group meeting to order. Jim is co-chair of the task group with Danny Cohen, Myricom. Jim discussed the status of the task group's efforts and Danny provided a brief overview of Myrinet. The initial draft of VITA 26 is available for review. See attached presentation.

Jonathan Jones, ICS Ltd., called the VITA 17, FPDP, task group meeting to order. Jon noted that draft 1.3 of VITA 17, FPDP was now available and that a task group ballot was scheduled for mid August.

*** BREAK ***

Lou Francz, Dialogic, discussed the results of the recirculation ballot for VITA 6.1, SCSA Extensions. One ballot was reversed from negative to positive. A recirculation ballot we be scheduled shortly.

Jim Pangburn, Fermi, called the VITA 25, VISION task group meeting to order. Draft 0.4 of the standard is available.

Jerry Braun, CRANE, discussed the results of tests that they have run on the 160 pin connector. In general the 160 pin connector looks extremely good. See attached presentation.

Lou Costrell, NIST, presented the VITA 23, VMEbus for Physics applications report. See attached overhead.

John Rynearson discussed future meeting dates. The September and November 1997 meetings will be held in Phoenix. The January meeting will be held in Santa Clara in conjunction with the Real Time Computer show. The March meeting is scheduled to be held in Geneva in conjunction with SysComms 98. The May 1998 meeting is scheduled for Phoenix and the July meeting will be held either in Vancouver or Ottawa.

With no further business pending, Jing Kwok adjourned the meeting.

Submitted by:

John Rynearson, VITA