Source: The Nation
The future of computing will not be about number crunching, but rather about intelligent computation powered by ParalleX, says Thomas Sterling, the father of high-performance computing.
Sterling, who teaches computer science at Louisiana State University, was the force behind the Beowulf Project. It involves a cluster system that has been designed as a cost-effective alternative to supercomputers.
ParalleX is a new computation model that will take advantage of future multicore clusters as they scale to petaflops capability, Sterling said. ParalleX will likely replace communicating-sequential-processes model and dominate high-performance computing in the next 15 years.
The advent of new computation technology is opening up new opportunities for every country, especially Thailand.
"The country needs to have the vision and the will to make a change. I think Thailand is already prepared for the future," he said.
The country started laying high-performance computing infrastructure several years ago. A Thai National Grid Centre has been set up to oversee development of grid computing in Thailand.
There are three ways in which the Kingdom can push high-performance computing technology, Sterling said.
It should ensure that educational institutions focus on high-performance computing, symbolic computation, innovative-operating system and advanced parallel programming; encourage innovation; and concentrate on research in what will dominate the field in the future rather than existing technologies.
"It's a change in designing, running and programming. The future of computing is simple designs that are dynamic and adaptive," he said.
Thailand should focus on developing products under its own brand, he said.
Publish Date:
06-16-2008
