Background Information About UconX Corporation

UconX Corporation is a San Diego, California-based company that provides data communication solutions for mission-critical systems and applications. In a mission-critical system, any perceptible down-time, errors, or delays can cause the failure of an entire operation. Many UconX customers design and build systems that analyze, act on, and display complex data collected from remote sites -- including systems for air traffic control, stock market trading, manufacturing process control, and power sub-station management.

UconX hardware and software products provide communication with these systems' remote sites, sometimes using standard protocols such as X.25, and sometimes custom or special-purpose protocols designed specifically for an industry or program. If the application supplies real-time telemetry data between a spacecraft and ground command station, a UconX product is working behind the scenes to channel the information through a large and complex computer system -- a task that remains quietly in the background, but is vital nonetheless.

UconX currently provides data communication solutions to the following market segments:

• Industry standard LAN-to-WAN applications for clients such as AT&T, TRW, and various weather services. Data communication software supported for this market includes X.25/PAD, HDLC LAPB, HDLC NRM, HDLC/SDLC frame transfer, DDCMP, asynchronous data transfer, and frame relay.
• Government and military applications, which use communication servers to receive radar data and to communicate with aircraft, satellites, and probes. Customers include E - Systems, GTE Government Systems, Jet Propulsion Laboratory and NASA, Hughes, Raytheon, and the Danish Air Force. Data communication software supported for this market includes ADCCP; radar receiver for CD-2, FPS 117, Marconi, ASTERIX, Thompson-CSF and Modified Eurocontrol formats; and synchronous bit stream interface.
• Process control (SCADA) industry including ESCA (Seattle, Washington) and CEGELEC (France), which use communication servers to monitor and control operations at power sub-stations, where there may not be a human attendant.
• Financial markets such as Reuters (London), Teknekron, Telerate Systems, and Telekurs, which use communication servers to tap into financial market data feeds (tickers) for trader workstations. Data communication software supported for this market includes HDLC ABM, which is used to receive the MarketFeed 2000 data feed and HDLC/SDLC frame transfer, which is used to receive the Telekurs data feed.
• Data communication developers (system integrators) in a variety of industries.

UconX also supports various development tools including ProtoKit and a source-level debugger.

Company Milestones.

UconX was founded in 1991 by the three principals who continue to direct the company's activities. Together they have 60 years of combined experience in developing and marketing data communication products. Noting the potential synergies available through UconX's software capabilities, Performance Technologies (which provides communication hardware) acquired a majority interest in UconX in October 1992. The firm became profitable after only one year of operation, and it has experienced steady growth in each successive year.

UconX Data Communication Hardware.

UconX provides a complete family of data communication servers based on a real-time STREAMS environment. These servers attach to a customer's local-area network (LAN) and provide wide-area network (WAN) connectivity for applications running on the LAN. Regardless of their CPU or architecture, all TCP/IP-equipped computers and workstations on the LAN can share the power of UconX communication services.

UconX servers include the following two families:

• The MPS 300/600 series is the newest addition to the UconX communication server family. Based on the latest hardware technology, these servers provide an economical but powerful solution for installations requiring from one to six serial lines and one or two Ethernet connections.
• For larger installations or those with special requirements, the MPS 3000 series of communication servers are based on a scalable and extensible open-systems architecture. Within this framework, UconX combines the features and capabilities required to create a standard product with a custom fit.

For systems requiring an SBus or VMEbus solution with a STREAMS-based communication environment, UconX supports a wide variety of high-speed intelligent communication controllers. Features include:

A range of Motorola 68XXX-family CPUs

Up to 8 Mbytes onboard DRAM

Up to 16 synchronous serial lines on a single controller

Full-duplex DMA capability on all serial lines

Serial line speeds to T1/E1 and beyond

A variety of electrical line interfaces, including RS-232, RS-422/449, EIA-530, V.35, and Mil Std 188C

Advantages of Communication Servers.

Communication servers provide a series of unique benefits over other communication solutions:

• The most distinctive benefit of communication servers -- as opposed to routers -- is their ability to directly link an application to the WAN. A router examines packets of data on the LAN, and when the packets are addressed to a remote network, the router forwards the packets through a WAN connection. At the remote site, another router reads the packets from the WAN connection and transfers them to the LAN. In contrast, a communication server is directly accessed from the application program, allowing complete control over the data that is transmitted and received on the serial lines.
• Communication servers also provide benefits unavailable through communication controllers installed in a host backplane (embedded controllers). A communication server can be shared equally by all clients on a LAN, and serial ports can be added through expansion or additional servers; in contrast, the host's backplane is clearly limited. Most important, if there is an assortment of client systems or a need for future upgrades, compatibility is not an issue with communication servers. Each system requires only the UconX application programming interface (API). An embedded controller requires porting a host device driver, which is very specific to a vendor's operating system, even if it is standard UNIX.
• UconX servers adhere to company's STREAMS industry standards. Their protocols are implemented according to recognized design guidelines so that protocols designed to run under UNIX STREAMS can be easily ported to UconX servers, and UconX protocols can be easily ported to UNIX systems.
• UconX communication servers can support a number of protocols -- a different one on each serial port -- and can be accessed simultaneously by multiple clients. This provides significant cost savings over other communication servers that require a block of eight or 16 ports to be assigned to a single protocol.
• The UconX application programming interface (API) allows a customer program to establish a network connection to the communication server and request access to a particular protocol. Once the connection is open, the program can begin sending and receiving data and control information in a format defined by the protocol in use. The API provides a standard STREAMS interface and shields the application from the actual TCP/IP interface used to communicate with the server.

UconX Data Communication Software and Services.

xSTRa™ is UconX's real-time executive for STREAMS applications. It manages the operating environment onboard the LAN server or communication controller.

• STREAMS was originally designed as a flexible facility for developing communication services in the UNIX environment, and it provides a standard interface that enables modular, portable development of protocol stacks.
• xSTRa is a real-time kernel, not a STREAMS emulator built on top of another operating system. This allows UconX to provide enhanced features and performance while maintaining a standard STREAMS interface and the standard STREAMS advantages.
• All UconX software products support multiple serial lines and are completely configurable. Users can run any combination of protocols simultaneously on the same LAN-based server or communication controller, and custom protocols can be developed to run alone or in combination with standard UconX protocols.

All UconX software products use the same client application programming interface (API), which is a simple, easy-to-use interface to protocol software running on the LAN-based server or embedded communication controller.

• The UconX API presents the standard STREAMS application interface familiar to many application programmers.
• The interface is constant across all UconX protocols, hardware platforms, and supported client systems -- regardless of whether the API is communicating with TCP/IP or a host driver, and whether or not the client operating system supports STREAMS.

Ordering Information: For more information or to place an order, please contact us at (619) 627-1700 or email us at sales@uconx.com . For technical questions about our products, please email us at tech@uconx.com .