Application specific format conversion and message distribution

The Universal Comms Processor (UCP), a Unix based software package, was developed to centralize in one system all of the rapidly changing components of message processing, and to allow easy modification of the parts of the system dealing with these changing components. The authors describe the specific UCP capabilities, provide insight into the design, and describe some applications. UCP uses a Backus-Naur-like grammar to convert a character-oriented message from its original format into another format. UCP uses operator-defined filter and routing tables, based on message origin or content, to route messages automatically among different communications links. The table-driven architectures gives the operator the ability to change the format definition or data distribution without any program modifications or recompilation, while the system is running. Instead of each application needing its own message processor, the UCP provides it with messages in a form easy to handle by the application