Reed's Ruminations: The Past, Present, and Future
Reflections on science, technology, and computing — leavened by personal experience
Category: High-Performance Computing
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Surrounded By Opportunities
Our run of good luck is over. We need new, integrated design methodologies and rich collaborations that consider end-to-end design and capability. In many ways, this is a return to the past.
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Thoughts on 9/11
I had the unusual experience of being on the Capitol Hill of the U.S. during the event. A brief summary of my experience is recounted here.
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Why We Compute
Why do we, as researchers and practitioners, have this deep and abiding love of computing? Why do we compute? I suspect it is a deeper, more primal yearning, one that underlies all of science and engineering and that unites us in a common cause. It is the insatiable desire to know and understand. From terascale…
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HPC In The Clouds: ISC Reflections
When any new technology appears, there is a great temptation to see it through the lens of the old, either in nomenclature or behavior. As with previous HPC technology transitions, clouds bring a set of technical and cultural challenges , but I believe we are moving down the path of successful adoption.
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Nothing Lasts Forever
No exponential continues forever, at least outside the mathematics textbooks. All technology-based advances are ultimately limited by something, usually some physical or economic limit. Innovation then shifts to other metrics, against which advances can be measured and valued. Computing is no exception.
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Battling Evil: Dark Silicon
Dark silicon, the very phrase sounds ominious and it is, for I believe it will profoundly reshape how we think about computing in the next decade. We soon will have (and in many cases already do have) chips with more transistors than can be concurrently activated. The practical implication is that most of the chip…