A balanced canonical form for discrete-time stable SISO all-pass systems is
obtained by requiring the realization to be balanced and such that the rea
chability matrix is upper triangular with positive diagonal entries, in ana
logy to the continuous-time balanced canonical form of Ober [O1]. It is sho
wn that the resulting balanced canonical form can be parametrized by Schur
parameters. The relation with the Schur parameters for stable AR systems is
established. Using the structure of the canonical form it is shown that, f
or the space of stable all-pass systems of order less than or equal to a fi
xed number n, the topology of pointwise convergence and the topology induce
d by H-2 coincide. The topological space thus obtained has the structure of
a hypersphere. Model reduction procedures based on truncation! which respe
ct the canonical form, are discussed.