Software Demos
(Last changes: Jan-4,1999)
What about SW-Demos in KIP?
The BLINDs WORLD I application
This was our rather complex bundle of programs for the ars electronica event July
1995. It was programmed in Objective-C under NeXTstep. It is still running in
our local network on two HP-workstations and can be seen here in the INM.
The problem with this implementation was that (1) the selected OS had a too small
user-base and the user Interface had to be programmed for every platform anew;
(2) the client-server structure -a good choice in many applications- revealed
itself as a very bad choice in our case.
After some 're-thinking' of the network architecture we designed a new concept
with Java as programming language. We did some experiments. The last one can be
downloaded below:
APPLET No. 3.0 (July-27,
1996)
Hardware: You will need at least the power of an Intel Pentium 90MHz with 16 MB
RAM. A modem with 14.400 Baud/s is enough.
Software: You need a browser which understands Java-Applets to handle 32-Bit software.
Load: You have to load about 271 KB of Data (the program itself is only about
56 KB)
This applet shows only a fragment of what we have already realized in the BLINDs
WORLD I application.
No more Applets!?!?!?
Working with Java-Applets we encountered many problems. Some problems depend on
the browser itself (an applet runing under 2.01 is not equally running under 3.0;
an applet running on one platform is not running on another one), some depend
on the limits applets have in general (e.g. two different applets can not communicate
directly; applets are too slow for real-time applications).
In a first reaction we decided to stop our Java activities, also because we detected
some advantages of Prolog with regard to the processes inside of the knowbots
(Dec 96).
For a special event, the Hannover Trade Fair April 1997, we have written the
combining a 3D-model of downtown Frankfurt (using the Clovis Graphic Package from
MIT on a SGI Onyx) and two knowbots living in this environment.
But for the Knowbot Kernel (Sicstus-)Prolog has won the race (June 97). The ability
of Prolog to express formal theories directly accompanied with a great expressiveness
to describe complex structures in only a few lines as well as the possibility
to use objects (every object is a small theory) is unbattable by any other existing
programming language. The first construction of a complete
Wittgenstein Agent ( = Knowbot 0-generation) this month was only due to this
features of Prolog.
At the CebitHOME'98 (Halle 4, Stand C12) we show our
DuckBug-Demonstrator.
Behind the actual (simple) GUI there is already a complete operating system
for artificial brains and contexts, written in Prolog. This will be part of
the next generation of INM-KNOWBOTs (for more information see also PAPERS/
STATEMENTS, especially INM
NEURON TAXONOMY.
