1. NSAP Technology Challenges and Frontiers
6 November 2008
NSAP Technology Challenges and Frontiers
Terri Betancourt
NSAP Engineering Deputy
(and 19 talented engineers)

2. Identifying Priorities
Outline
Identifying Priorities
Managing Resources
(Imperatives)
Looking Forward
(Frontiers)

3. Identifying Priorities
Imperatives in managing resources
Focus on cost-effective decisions
Implement reliability measures
Factor in salary cost spent on inexpensive solutions
Mitigate risks to UCAR and customers
Frontiers in NSAP technologies
Pursue technologies that allow users to be more effective in their decision making
Pursue technologies that increase efficiencies in computational resources

4. Imperative: Dedicated Computing Cycles
Adapt to limitations of CISL shared resources
Purchase project-centric clusters
Take advantage of HPC MSRC where possible
Fabric:
CISL, MMM, UCAR Contracts
From One to many…

5. Imperative: Distributed Facilities
Meet Customer’s on-site requirements
Adapt to UCAR facilities constraints
Dell clusters off-site
10 racks 80 nodes
160 processors
Dell clusters at NCAR
26 racks
437 nodes
1332 processors (1/3 #processor of Bluefire)
LNXI HPC at DPG
4 racks 64 nodes
256 processors

6. Imperative: Web of Data Management
Address I/O inefficiencies
Expand data storage capacity
Optimize data distribution strategies

7. Imperative: Secure Engineering Practices
Assess security risks in distributed facilities
Affect change in the responsibility mindset
Fabric:
Computer Security Advisory Committee (CSAC)

8. Looking Forward…
Priority: Pursue technologies that increase efficiencies in computational resources
Frontier: Graphical Processing Units (GPU)
From gaming to science…
Coordinate transformation 30x speedup using IDL API to GPULib from Tech-X

9. Looking Forward…
Priority: Pursue technologies that allow users to be more effective in their decision making
Frontier: Real-time 3-D visualization for emergency management
Fabric:
GIS Initiative
STAR Institute

10. Taking measures to transition research into operations
NSAP Engineering
Taking measures to transition
research into operations
efficiently and effectively