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TRON: The Unknown Open-Source?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the ordinary-life dept.

jordandeamattson writes "Over on CNN there is a very interesting article about Tron, an open-source real-time operating system from Japan first developed and distributed in the early 1980s. The claim is that it is more widely distributed than Windows (in some 3 billion devices world-wide), that the developer (Ken Sakamura, a University professor) would be worth mucho if he had just charged for it, and that Microsoft/U.S. goverment used trade rules (Super 301) to block it adoption by schools in Japan. Check it out for an interesting read and a 'what might have been ...'" (Here's a previous mention of Tron from March about MontaVista's work to combine it with Linux.)

18 of 437 comments (clear)

  1. Home page by makapuf · · Score: 5, Informative

    Sure, there's google, but there seems to be the TRON OS home page, in english.

    Besides, what devices run than OS ? anyone know ?

    1. Re:Home page by NuMessiah · · Score: 5, Informative

      OK, but there is more interesting info at:

      TRON Project Information

      and

      TRON Web

      also in english :)

      bb4now,
      PMC

      --
      we-go-we-fly
    2. Re:Home page by torpor · · Score: 5, Informative


      Pretty much any Japanese electronic musical instrument maker has used TRON. Yamaha keyboards run it, or derivatives of it, I've been told. That will change now though, with Yamaha's recent announcement that they'll be using Linux.

      I've followed TRON since I was a kid hacker in the early 80's, and have watched its use in the industry with eager anticipation of the day it becomes more widely known about in the tech sector.

      When Linux came into existence (I've been a Linux user since *day one* of its existence), I decided I need not stay current with TRON, which is a shame because I think a lot of the goals of TRON (E-TRON, actually, its supposed to be called) are achievable right now with Linux in the embedded world.

      If ever there was proof needed of just how destructive Microsoft has been for the computer industry, it is the fact that hardly anyone in the Western Tech sector (sillicon valley) knows about TRON and what this project was supposed to achieve... and, actually, still is capable of achieving... The project is based around shared source, completely open amongst competing hardware manufacturers.

      Embedded kernels running in every electronic device known to man, capable of talking to each other discretely and without human interaction, to create a sort of 'Boewulf cluster' of embedded systems capable of sharing loads and processing power.

      TRON was a kick ass project. And everything we've wanted to do with TRON, we can now do with Linux.

      --
      ; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
    3. Re:Home page by doctor_no · · Score: 5, Informative

      TRON today basically has a monopoly on most embedded devices in the world; if you you've used a cell phone, digital camera, driven a car, opened a fridge, played a movie on your VCD/DVD player, turned on your TV, you've likely used TRON in one form or another.

      In fact the TRON engine standards group(T-Engine) has more than 100 members worldwide including Fujitsu, Fuji Electric, Hitachi, Kyocera, Mitsubishi Electric Corporation, MIPS, NEC, NTT, NTT DATA, NTT DoCoMo, RSA Security, Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology, Sony, Sharp, Toshiba, Yamaha, Yazaki, and Yokogawa Digital Computer Corp, Toyota, Honda, etc.

      Until Linux becomes a fully real-time OS it's unlikely that it'll replace TRON out of the embedded market.

  2. Re:TRON is an "embedded" operating system... by makapuf · · Score: 2, Informative

    By RTFA and reading that TRON can run on normal PC. It could also have been the OS of choice for todays peecees if arm-twisting hadn't happened.

  3. More information... by Noryungi · · Score: 2, Informative

    Here, and here.

    (All links courtesy of google).

    --
    The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
  4. Re:Dollar Billionaire? by AstroDrabb · · Score: 1, Informative

    You can be a paper billionaire in the sense that you own a lot of property etc. However, you don't actually have a billion dollars in the bank. A dollar billionaire on the other hand DOES have a billion or more in CASH! For exaple, I can add up the value of my home, my cars, computers etc, and one could say that the value of all that plus the cash I have is what I am worth on paper. However, I don't actually have that cash at my disposal.

    --
    If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land,
    it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. -James Madison
  5. TRON need not be embedded by kahei · · Score: 4, Informative


    There are various areas in the TRON project. BTRON would be the desktop-OS oriented part, and that's where the Chokanji OS comes from, still the best environment for DTP in Japanese.

    I can remember when TRON was going to save us all from Unicode with its TRON Multilingual Environment. It didn't work out but it did result in quite a nice platform for Mojikyo.

    --
    Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
  6. Screenshots for Desktop TRON be here by RevAaron · · Score: 5, Informative

    http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/btronproducts.html

    enjoy...

    --

    Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
  7. Re:First Post by schon · · Score: 3, Informative

    Tron was a simple program, written only to destroy the MCP

    No, actually, Tron was written to shut down programs that perform illegal operations. When he wrote TRON, Allan Bradley didn't even know that MCP was performing illegal operations.

  8. Assuming is silly ... by torpor · · Score: 2, Informative

    ... but underestimating the effect which TRON has had on the industry is also silly. TRON was designed to run *everywhere* - circa 70's era technology - and has.

    The JAVA guys found big inspiration in TRON as a project, and in fact there is reason to believe that Sun held the TRON project up as an example of 'embedded processing' done right in the early days of the JAVA project.

    To underestimate how much this would've been worth, had it not been for a little slack licensing, is to discount the story here.

    Projects like this ARE worth lots, and lots, and lots of money.

    And while TRON may not be the mega-system it was supposed to be (actually, it was supposed to be the worlds biggest computing system), all of this is still feasible with Linux.

    --
    ; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
  9. Some GPL code here. by pario · · Score: 2, Informative

    You can download come code off this Japanese page. Just click the first link in the right column.

    TOPPERS is a GPL implementation of the ITRON (Industrial TRON) specifiction for embedded computers. You can find more information about it in this paper.

  10. Re:MICROSOFT used trade rules? by Abcd1234 · · Score: 2, Informative

    This still sounds awfully wierd, i'm surprised the U.S. would be able to get away with something like that and I suspect the cnn.com author *may* be glossing over something, but that's not the article submitters' fault.

    Hardly. The US participates in economic protectionism on a very regular basis. Hell, with Canada, their #1 trading partner, there was the soft wood lumber dispute, not to mention embargos on Canadian grain. And we're part of a free trade agreement! I can only imagine what the US does to it's other trading partners...

  11. Tron + Linux = T-Linux by doctor_no · · Score: 2, Informative

    It seems that there is already a project underway to integrate Tron with Linux. . .

    Tron + Linux = T-Linux.

    "The T-Engine Forum and MontaVista Software announced that they are collaborating to combine TRON ("The Real-time Operating system Nucleus") -- the long-dominant Japanese embedded operating system -- with embedded Linux, in an effort to create a standardized software architecture for embedded devices that takes advantage of open source software and the benefits of Linux, while retaining a degree of compatibility with TRON."

  12. Re:Yes but.. by 2TecTom · · Score: 2, Informative
    B-Free

    but seems to be /.'d

    Also ODP - Tron

    --
    Words to men, as air to birds.
  13. Re:First Post by cshark · · Score: 2, Informative

    I'll do you one better. MinuetOS is a full windowing OS in less than 2MB. http://www.menuetos.org/

    --

    This signature has Super Cow Powers

  14. Re:1989? Microsoft?? by swillden · · Score: 2, Informative

    Err... smartcards just store data, they don't have an embedded OS on them.

    Really? The creators of:

    might disagree.

    I've actually used all but two of the above. There are many more, but I got tired of googling for links.

    --
    Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
  15. Re:1989? Microsoft?? by Mostly+a+lurker · · Score: 2, Informative
    It is more likely that the trade barrier being described would be for sale of hardware rather than for software.

    No ... amazingly enough, the system they complained about was based on an Intel processor. This must be seen in the context of the political and economic climate of the time. The US was having its head handed to it in most consumer electronics areas. They were terrified that, if the desktop market in Japan was based on a (superior) architecture developed in Japan, they would lose the entire market. To say nothing of what might have happened in the rest of the world ...

    The action against TRON by the US (government and industry) in 1980 was an injustice. At the time, though, the US was in what it viewed as an economic fight for survival and "alls fair in love and war".