Ninja and the Post-PC Era

David Culler U.C. Berkeley Mar 12, 1999 http://ninja.cs.berkeley.edu

http://postPC.cs.berkeley.edu

Natural Tides of Innovation

Log R Personal Computer Workstation Server Minicomputer Mainframe 3/12/99 Time Lucent visit 2/99 Innovation Integration

Exciting components

3/12/99 Lucent visit

Historical Perspective

• • • • •

New eras of computing start when the previous era is so strong it is hard to imagine that things could ever be different

– – –

mainframe -> mini mini -> workstation -> PC PC -> ???

It is always smaller than what came before.

Most think of the new technology as “just a toy” The new dominant use was almost completely absent before.

Technology spread increases

•

So where are we headed in the post-PC era?

3/12/99 Lucent visit

Away from the “average device”

• • •

Powerful, personal capabilities from specialized devices

–

small, highly mobile or embedded in the environment Intelligence + immense storage and processing in

the infrastructure

Everything connected Devices Lucent visit

Laptops, Desktops

3/12/99

Imagine

• You walk into a room • Your PDA connects to the local infrastructure and asks it to build a custom GUI • Next, your PDA asks the infrastructure for a path out to your personal information space , where agents are processing your e-mail, v-mail, faxes, and pages

You have complete, secure, optimized access to local devices and your private resources

3/12/99 Lucent visit

Structured Architecture

• Bases – highly available – persistent state (safe) – databases, agents – “home” base per user – service programming environment • Active Proxies – not packet routers – soft-state – well-connected – localization (any to any) • Units – sensors / actuators – PDAs / smartphones / PCs – heterogeneous – Minimal functionality: “Smart Clients”

3/12/99 Lucent visit Wide-Area Path

Service Execution Environment

Service request operator upload service threads Managed RMI++ Persistent Storage Physical processor Operators Caches

• parallel application framework on Bases – RMI++ hides complexity of scalability and availability – Dynamic customization and composition • apSpace is limited execution environment for AR

3/12/99 Lucent visit

Base Execution Environment

• • •

Ninja RMI

– –

Sun RMI compatible serialization and thread management ninja remote object + TCP or UDP or Multicast UDP (Active Msg soon) + Authenticated public key iS-box

–

customizable service VM Redirector = iSpace Lucent visit 3/12/99

iS-box

• • •

Loader Extends JVM to support services

– – – –

LoadService (URL, name, args) ListServices GetService(name) -> svc obj KillService Trusted services loaded at startup Security MGR interposes on method calls

–

loaded as a trusted service Lucent visit 3/12/99 Security MGR JVM

Push Services into the Infrastructure

New service Security MGR JVM RMI stubs Generated by RMI compiler

• •

GetService returns service object Programming Model for Service Methods?

Service Methods 3/12/99 Lucent visit

Scalable iSpace

iS-box Node iS-box Node Multi-Space iS-box Node System Area Network

• • •

Multi-Space services across group of iS boxes List, Get, or Load Service from any Get returns redirector stub 3/12/99 Lucent visit iS-box Node JVM Security MGR

Redirector Stub

• • •

Uses almost same RMI dynamic code generation Produces RMI stub that manages load balancing and fail over across iS-boxes in iSpace Allows full spectrum of smart-client, front end, flat cluster RMI stubs Load Balance / Fail-over Policy Generated by RMI compiler 3/12/99 Distributed Objects - not just remote Lucent visit

Existing Applications

•

Ninja "NOW Jukebox"

– –

Harnesses Berkeley Network of Workstations Plays real-time MPEG-3 audio served from 110+ CD's worth of music

•

Voice-enabled room control

–

Speech-to-text Operators control room services (camera, lights, microphone)

–

Eventual integration with GSM cell phones and PDA-based UI

•

Stock Trading Service

– –

Accesses real-time stock data from Internet Programmatic interface to buy/sell/trade stocks through online brokerage

•

NinjaFAX

– –

Programmable remotely-accessed FAX machine service Send/receive FAXes; authentication used for access control

•

Keiretsu: The Ninja Pager Service 3/12/99

–

Provides instant messaging service via Web, 1/2-way pagers, WorkPads, etc.

Lucent visit

Future Applications

• Universal Inbox –

e-mail, FAX, pager, voicemail accessible anywhere

• Universal Remote –

multiple-UI control of household/room devices

–

automatic UI generation

• Ecash Mint –

Authenticated service to act as digital secure cash mint 3/12/99 Lucent visit

Complements industry PostPC efforts

• • •

Get maximum number of applications first

– – –

1990 PC capality in handheld device microkernel port of Unix or Windows emulate vast API Turn devices into appliances Mobile extension of dedicated PC

–

take short excursion and synch

• •

Success of the Palm Pilot with primitive OS and split application model is significant

–

it’s the approach, not the technical superiority Need to develop foundations for next generation 3/12/99 Lucent visit

Seeds sewn in many projects

• • • • • • • • • •

Devices - Infopad, IRAM Scalable Servers - NOW, Millennium Storage - Tertiary Disk, Istore, Aetherstore Sensors and Actuators - BSAC Connectivity - BWRC Transcoding Services - Wingman, Mediaboard Platform Architecture - Ninja Computing/Telephony Integration - Iceberg Programming Enviornments and Tools User interfaces - Notepals Lucent visit 3/12/99

Building the Bazaar

•

What we need is not just a new research project, but a new “computing culture” => Build a department-wide, universal wireless PDA infrastructure and a community to take it forward

•

Initial Seed Fall 98 with IBM

–

150+ IBM workpads + lots of cradles + IR + ???

•

Initial community

– – – –

Ninja, ICEBERG, MASH grad students Senior UI Class (CS 160) All interested 1st year CS grads (CS 252, 261, 262 projects) Fill out based on interest, talent and availability => “ask a good question and get yours” seminar 3/12/99 Lucent visit

Fall’98 Project Excerpts

•

E-Commerce and Security

– – –

Pay-Per-Use Services on the Palm Computing Platform (Mike Chen, Andrew Geweke) Secure Email Infrastructure for PDAs (Hoon Kang, Rob von Behren) SyncAnywhere - Secure Network HotSync (Mike Chen, Helen Wang)

• •

Groupware

– – – –

Kiretsu - Ninja Instant Messaging Service (Matt Welsh, Steve Gribble) The MASH MediaPad - Shared Electronic Whiteboard for the PalmPilot (Yatin Chawathe) NotePals - Lightweight Meeting Support Using PDAs (Richard Davis) OSKI - Open Shared Kalendaring Infrastructure Newman) (Jason Hong, Brad Morrey, Mark OS and Communications

–

PalmRouter - Networking Sporadically Connected Devices Szewczyk) (Andras Ferencz, Robert

• •

Numerous Architecture Studies Excellent UI Projects

–

Ink Chat, Nutrition/Excercise Tracker, Rendezvous - Meeting Scheduler 3/12/99 Lucent visit

Some Lessons

•

Communication is enabling

–

low-power wireless needs to be like IP

•

Virtual Environment is important

–

Devices connect “into the infrastructure”

»

Network HotSync, groupware, centralized e-mail

•

=> Need lean, clean communication substrate “User Service” is fundamental

– –

not just profile and customization info routing point for security

•

Much room for improvement in devices

–

trade BW for compute or storage

•

Development effort is the limiting factor

–

OSKI: 1 person for infrastructure, 2 for WorkPad 3/12/99 => need complete distributed system debugging and simulation environment Lucent visit

Momentum Building

Massive Cluster Gigabit Ethernet Clusters

Wireless Infrastructure

PDAs Servers Desktop PCs Cell Phones Future Devices

• • •

Deploy postPC infrastructure throughout building Millennium provides large-scale testbed Ninja architecture allows developers to “Push Services into the Infrastructure” 3/12/99 Lucent visit

Oceanic Vision: fluid software

• • • • • •

devices everywhere backed by massive, fluid data storage and composible services operating systems for vastly diverse devices

–

down to sensors and actuators streaming data management

– –

data derived from sensors and activities, not key entry incremental query automated negotiation architecture derive organization from activities

– –

social networking computational economies Lucent visit 3/12/99

Roles, Collaboration, and Environment

• • • • •

Bold, Rich PostPC Agenda Emerging New balance of expertise and technology between industry and university

–

devices, components, networks, applications, users New roles and relationships in collaboration

–

how do we share space, environment, culture, not just technology Fundamentally new demands on the research space

– – –

ability to deploy smart spaces on a large scale experimental wireless networking new modes of human interaction It’s not just what we build, but how we use it Lucent visit 3/12/99