HPC 2014-15 | Contents Contents How to encourage more


people to use HPC? Here is a sobering statistic: 95 per cent of engineers continue to use desk-side workstations even though they want more computational power. Only five per cent have made the transition to high- performance computing (HPC). In the past, the machines cost so much that only Government-


funded institutions could afford HPC. Nowadays, in contrast, commodity hardware has brought the price down and the cloud offers an even cheaper solution for the occasional big job. But uptake is still low. HPC is seen as ‘difficult’: legacy soſtware


needs to be rewritten in parallel; it needs to be optimised for the heterogeneous hardware on which it will run; clusters need to be configured; and workloads need to be structured to make the most efficient use of resources. In this year’s View into high performance computing, therefore,


Power and the processor The future of HPC in Australia Need a network? Storage: critical to computing Tools to make HPC easier Directory of suppliers


A comprehensive list of suppliers, consultants, and integrators in HPC


4


John Barr surveys the technologies that will underpin the next generation of HPC, and predicts that software will be as important as hardware


10


Lindsay Botten and Neil Stringfellow discuss Australia’s unique challenges in science, climate, and economic development – and how HPC is helping


14


Tom Wilkie considers an organisation that is removing barriers to end-user access and that could serve as a model for international cooperation in technology development


20


Robert Roe reports on the rise of data-centric computing and its implications for the providers of data storage


24


Tom Wilkie looks at the software tools that could make life easier for systems administrators and end-users alike


35


EDITORIAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE TEAM Editor-in-Chief: Dr Tom Wilkie (editor.scw@europascience.com) Technical writer: Robert Roe (editor.scw@europascience.com) Circulation/readership enquiries: Pete Vine (subs@europascience.com)


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Cover: Oleksiy Mark/SkillUp/Vlastas/ Flegere/Shutterstock.com 3


we give an example of how HPC can benefit the economic and national interests of a relatively small country, Australia (p10). We also describe a model for international cooperation on technology (p14) – one that has, moreover, made sophisticated technology simpler and easier to use. Other good news is that there is plenty of innovation in soſtware


tools that can make HPC easier for systems administrators and end-users, and thus encourage uptake (p24). On the other hand, developments in hardware will inevitably complicate the picture again (p4). Finally, we examine the consequences of the rise of data- centric computing (p20).


Dr Tom Wilkie Editor-in-Chief


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