News on FGCS Technology and related activities by Research Institute for Advanced Information Technology (AITEC), the successor of ICOT

JIPDEC AITEC News

May 27, 1996 Issue #2

[Table of Contents]

Introduction
AITEC-NEWS Headline

Intdoduction of AITEC
The Workshop of IFS Further Development Project
Renewal of AITEC Home Page

Message from the editorial desk

INTRODUCTION

The rains in March seem to bring the spring closer to us here in Tokyo. The cherry blossoms will soon burst forth, and new recruits will make their first steps in the business world. Both new and experienced personnel usually move on to a new start in this beautiful season. AITEC, the Research Institute for Advanced Information Technology, was inaugurated in October 1995 as we announced in the first edition of AITEC NEWS. In response to your questions about what we do and how we work at AITEC, in this issue we would like to describe our activities. Since AITEC is a new and small laboratory with just a few researchers, we strongly hope to work together with you, the readers of AITEC NEWS, in order to extend the range of our research and related activities, just like a tree grows with the gifts of sunshine and water on good land. As AITEC grows up, we wish to share the joy as our activities blossom with you. Let's start with the headline of AITEC NEWS No.2. (Chie Takahashi)

[AITEC NEWS HEADLINE]

1. Introduction of AITEC

The organization, members and activities of AITEC are introduced in the first article. AITEC has two main responsible roles. One is to disseminate and accelerate the commercialization of ICOT Free Software (IFS), and the other is to investigate the future direction of advanced information technology (A.I.T.). The former role was started at the same time as AITEC began its activities. Here, we will introduce how we intend to disseminate and further develop IFS.

(Article No.2-1)

2. The Workshop of IFS Further Development Project

The workshop of the IFS Further Development Project was held on March 11 and 12, 1996. 22 groups of professors and students gathered from 20 universities in Japan, who are conducting research projects funded by AITEC. They reported their progress and held lively discussions. Please refer to the first edition of AITEC NEWS regarding the kind of projects being conducted. Here, we report how the workshop went.

(Article No.2-2)

3. Renewal of AITEC Home Page

The AITEC Home Page on Internet was renewed, and now introduces the activities of AITEC and IFS Dissemination and Development. Please check it out! http://www.icot.or.jp/ We will update the Home Page periodical--don't miss it. (No reference articles)

1. Introduction of AITEC

The AITEC office, as we announced in the last NEWS, is located at Shiba Tokyo Kaijo Bldg., at the cross roads by Kanasugi Bridge near JR Hamamatsucho Station. Take a look at AITEC Home Page. (http://www.icot.or.jp/GENE/way-to-AITEC-E.html) Two key roles of AITEC are first, IFS dissemination and development, and second, investigation of the future direction of advanced information technology (A.I.T.). We have been working steadily to achieve these goals since the start of AITEC. For the former role, we have been working on the following:

1. Distribution and maintenance of IFS

2. Setting up computers and related equipment

3. Selecting appropriate research proposals for the IFS Further Development Project

For the latter role, we are now preparing for a new department called Investigation Department. We are gathering people, trying to decide fields to investigate, and so on. We intend that the research results can help our government set up better policies and business leaders make better plans for their R & D. Let's briefly introduce the organization and members of AITEC. Here is the AITEC organization chart: +-- FGCS---------+---Dissemination and---+-KLIC-TG | Department | Development Section |(Prof.Chikayama) | (Mr.Ogawa) | (Mr.Kaneda) +-Other TGs | +---IFS Promotion Section | | (Mr.Ogawa, Mr.Moro) | +-Senior Researcher | (Dr.Aiba) | Director--+---Investigation------Investigation Section (Dr.Uchida) | Department (Mr.Sato) | +---General Affairs --+--General Affairs Section Department | (Mr.Okuyama) (Mr.Okuyama) +--Accounting Section (Mr.Komine) Refer to the AITEC Home Page for the AITEC organization. AITEC has three departments: -FGCS Department is mainly engaged in disseminating and further developing IFS with the help of the Task Groups(TGs). Most of the TG members are ICOT OBs who moved to universities or came back to their companies. Currently, only KLIC-TG is working actively. -Investigation Department is under construction. The role of this department is to tell the future direction of A.I.T. in order to help our goverment and bussiness leaders. Research results of this department are planned to be published through AITEC NEWS and other media. -General Affairs deparment will work for logistics of AITEC whole activities, management of budget and so on. Next, let's introduce important sections and their related staff members. The most important section for you, IFS users, may be IFS Dissemination and Development Section. Here, we have Ms. Orie Chubachi* who is in charge of communication between the IFS users and us. Some of you may have already had contact with her when you have had some troubles on IFS since she has been involved in it for about two years. Please don't hesitate to contact her if you have any questions or requests concerning IFS.

Ms. Orie Chubachi: E-mail: ifs@icot.or.jp

Tel: 81-3-3456-2514 Fax: 81-3-3456-1618

This section has several full-time and non-full time software people to maintain IFS such as Tetsuro Fujise*, Daigo Sekita*, and Yutaka Niibe*. They are also KLIC-TG members and work together with other TG members. KLIC-TG is headed by Prof. Takashi Chikayama who is now a professor of the University of Tokyo. We hope that other TGs for such as the MGTP theorem prover group, the Quixote knowledge base group, and so on will raise their activities more in this year. KLIC-TG has been very busy because they did not only fix bugs of the KLIC system but also hold several KLIC seminars and promotion events. (For details of the previous seminars held at the University of Electro Communications and Science University of Tokyo, please refer to AITEC NEWS No. 1. You can also check it on the AITEC Home Page.

http://www.icot.or.jp/AITEC/PUBLICATIONS/AITEC-News/aitec-news-E.html) If you are interested in current status of KLIC maintenance and porting, please contact to Mr. Tetsuro Fujise (fujise@icot.or.jp). If you are interested in the KLIC seminars, contact to Mr. Kiyoshi Kaneda, (E-mail: kaneda@icot.or.jp. ) Another IFS program maintained and extended in this section is the new HELIC-II legal reasoning system. It is maintained by Hiroshi Ohsaki, who has been looking after it since ICOT existed. Refer to the AITEC Home Page for details. http://www.icot.or.jp/Museum/IFS/IFS-column-E.html The MGTP (Model Generation Theorem Prover) is also maintained by a TG consisting of the MGTP research group, which was formed when ICOT existed. Currently, Yasuyuki Shirai* is mainly maintaining the MGTP. Genetic Information Processing (GIP) systems are mainly maintained by Yasushi Totoki* and Reiko Tanaka* who were also ICOT GIP members. Some of these systems, such as the aligner and editor system can be used on a single workstation such as Sun-3 and evaluated highly by many biologists. Please refer to IFS No.93, 75, 76, 83, 94, 95, 96 for details. Quixote is supported by Ms. Chie Takahashi, who has been working since the inception of Quixote at ICOT. She is presently organizing an easy-to-use environment for Quixote. Please refer to the AITEC Home Page for details. http://www.icot.or.jp/Museum/IFS/IFS-column-E.html (NOTE: Members' names with * indicate no-full time AITEC members There are many other ex-ICOT members who continue to support us in addition to those mentioned here.) The IFS Promotion Section is mainly managing collaboration with research groups at universities on IFS Further Development Project which intends to reproduce more advanced IFS programs. The staff of the IFS Promotion Section are Mr. Tomoaki Moro and Ms. Makiko Sato. The IFS Further Development Project in FY'95 selected twenty-two proposals. The workshop of the project was held on March 11 and 12 at the Tokyo Grand Hotel. Please refer to the AITEC Home Page for the abstract of each research. Also, there will be a follow-up report on the progress of the project on the AITEC Home Page.(We are sorry! We only prepared the Japanese version.) We expect to be able to accept several more projects in FY'96. Please contact the following if you are interested in the IFS Further Development Project: Mr. Tomoaki Moro, E-mail: moro@icot.or.jp. ( We are sorry for foreign readers. Currently, we accept the proposals from only domestic universities.) Either this year or next year, we expect some useful software to be developed by some of the university groups. (Chie Takahashi)

2. The Workshop of IFS Further Development Project

The workshop of the IFS Further Development Project was held on March 11 and 12 at the Tokyo Grand Hotel. Refer to AITEC NEWS No. 1 for the titles and researchers of the twenty-two selected research themes. Here, I would like to report how the workshop went. Prof. Kazuhiro Fuchi, the evaluation committee chairman declared the workshop open at 10:00 a.m. on March 11. Director Shunichi Uchida of AITEC followed with his explanation of the objectives of the project. Each researcher of the 22 research themes then had 30 minutes for presentation and Q & A. Nearly fifty participants attended the workshop and there were lively discussions after each presentation. The presentations varied from logical language processing and natural language processing to legal and genetic areas, and all were based on IFS. I felt that 30 minutes was too short for researchers to finish their presentations. Actual presentations were mainly given by doctor or master students instead of young professors who are ICOT old boys. This indicates that a generation change of actual researcher is under way. It is marvelous that FGCS technology is smoothly being taken over by a younger generation. Mr. Ichikawa, Managing Director of Japan Information Processing Development Center (JIPDEC), gave the closing remark, calling for participation in next year's projects again and expressing his appreciation to all those who participated. (Akira Aiba)

[MESSAGE FROM THE EDITORIAL DESK]

We hope you enjoyed AITEC NEWS No. 2. The Editorial Team hopes to continue giving you interesting and new information through AITEC NEWS. We plan to introduce not only our formal activities but also interesting events and informal articles. Your requests, ideas and comments on AITEC NEWS or on our activities are anytime welcome--just write to us! ( aitec-news@icot.or.jp ) If you have the chance to visit Tokyo, please drop in our office. We're very much looking forward to seeing you! Please let us know if you have changed your E-mail address. See you in the next AITEC NEWS. ********************************************************************** * * * A I T E C N E W S Issue #2 * * AITEC NEWS Editorial Team: * * Makiko Sato, Chie Takahashi, Akira Aiba * * Hiroshi Sato, Shunichi Uchida * * Issued: May 27, 1996 * * By: Research Institute for Advanced Information * * Technology (AITEC), a subcenter of * * Japan Information Processing Development * * Center (JIPDEC) * * 2-3-3, Minato-ku, Shiba, Tokyo 105, Japan * * Tel: 03-3456-3191 Fax: 03-3455-4877 * * E-mail: aitec-news@icot.or.jp * * * **********************************************************************

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