The Alvey Programme was a
British government sponsored research programme in
information technology
Information technology (IT) is the use of computers to create, process, store, retrieve, and exchange all kinds of Data (computing), data . and information. IT forms part of information and communications technology (ICT). An information te ...
that ran from 1984 to 1990. The programme was a reaction to the Japanese
Fifth Generation project, which aimed to create a computer using
massively parallel computing/processing. The programme was not focused on any specific technology such as robotics, but rather supported research in knowledge engineering in the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
. It has been likened in operations to the
U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and Japan's ICOT.
Background
During the early 1980s, Japan invited the United Kingdom to become a part of the Fifth Generation Project.
In October 1981, a Department of Industry mission to Japan consisting of academics, civil servants and business representatives explored collaboration opportunities and attended the Fifth Generation conference.
Informed by negotiations between ICL and Fujitsu conducted to "ensure the survival of ICL", suggesting that collaboration would only be possible in "very specific areas agreed upon by individual companies", it was concluded that an emulation of the Japanese approach would be preferable to any attempt at participating in the Japanese programme.
In response, a committee was created and was chaired by John Alvey, a technology director at
British Telecom. The report generated proposed a different course of action to the Japanese initiative and became the basis for the UK's rejection of the Fifth Generation and the creation of its own Alvey Programme. The programme's fundamental goal was the improvement of the advanced information technology in the UK to address the declining performance of this sector.
It operated in 1984 until 1990.
Alvey was not involved in the programme itself.
The main focus areas of the Alvey Programme were as follows:
* Advanced Microelectronics and
VLSI
Very large-scale integration (VLSI) is the process of creating an integrated circuit (IC) by combining millions or billions of MOS transistors onto a single chip. VLSI began in the 1970s when MOS integrated circuit (Metal Oxide Semiconductor) ...
*
Intelligent Knowledge Based Systems (IKBS) or
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech r ...
(AI)
*
Software Engineering
Software engineering is a systematic engineering approach to software development.
A software engineer is a person who applies the principles of software engineering to design, develop, maintain, test, and evaluate computer software. The term '' ...
*
Man-Machine Interaction (including
Natural Language Processing)
Alongside these areas, the provision of a communications infrastructure was a component of the programme.
Various areas of endeavour were incorporated into the main focus areas. For example,
systems architecture A system architecture is the conceptual model that defines the structure, behavior, and more views of a system. An architecture description is a formal description and representation of a system, organized in a way that supports reasoning about the ...
, specifically
parallel processing, featured in the VLSI endeavour.
References
*
Brian Oakley and Kenneth Owen, ''Alvey: Britain's Strategic Computing Initiative'',
MIT Press
The MIT Press is a university press affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts (United States). It was established in 1962.
History
The MIT Press traces its origins back to 1926 when MIT publish ...
, 1990. {{ISBN, 0-262-15038-7
* Chris Rigatuso, Takeshi Tachi, Dennis Sysvester & Mark Soper
''Collaboration between Firms in Information Technology'' Berkeley, EE 290X Group G.
* Richard Tyler, The Daily Telegraph, Feb 9th 2010
1984 establishments in the United Kingdom
1990 disestablishments in the United Kingdom
History of artificial intelligence
History of computing in the United Kingdom
Research and development in the United Kingdom
Research projects