gtaylor@lasspvax.UUCP (Greg Taylor) (04/22/85)
The Center for Theory and Simulation in Science and
Engineering at Cornell University is one of the recipients
of a recent NSF grant for the development and implementation
of Supercomputers for the theoretical and academic environ-
ment. In our case, the Theory Center is pursuing this end in
two ways, both of which offer considerable opportunities for
interesting and challenging work.
We invite you to watch the network for upcoming job
postings. For the present, here's a brief description of
what we're working on:
A part of the funding involves the acquisition of a
Production Supercomputer facility-consisting of an IBM
(an IBM 3084 QX), and four Floating Point Systems FPS-264
Array Processors. This facility will be accesible to users
through ARPANET and BITNET connections.
In addition to this, we have an ongoing project which
involves the use of massively parallel architectures for the
creation of a 1990's computing environment. There is a
strong interest in this work throughout the Cornell commun-
ity, whose strength and prestige in the theoretical sciences
is well known. The Theorynet is the LAN that theorists will
be using to access both the PSF and the massively experimen-
tal experimental system. For this network, we are laying
fiber optic cables and will have a PRONET backbone with more
local Ethernets. On the business end, there are a consider-
able number of different machines, lots of them running
4.2BSD. You might infer from this that we have a strong
interest in the development and implementation of network
servers of various kinds, including file servers and backend
supercomputers.
It is our intention to acquire a massively parallel
system in the near future, and interface it to a UNIX host:
To this end, we will be building software for a whole sys-
tem. Some of our current work involves the use of UNIX in a
parallel processing environment (based around a 4.2bsd UNIX
machine equipped with eight FPS-100 array processors operat-
ing on an Aptec buss and an IBIS disk for Mass memory)
We will be endeavouring to build a UNIX-based toolkit
for the theorists that use the system through the Theorynet,
and continuing our work on the GIBBS software productivity
project (an ongoing research project which has as its aim
the development of a unique programming environment for the
theoretical sciences).
The Theory Center will be working closely with the Com-
puter Graphics Reasearch Project at Cornell (under the
leadership of Don Greenberg)developing a graphics environment
based on a super-workstation with a computing capability of
about 35 megaflops. Goal is to produce graphics outputs from
simulations done on supercomputer in real time or something
closely approaching it.
In addition we'll be working
on networking, UNIX support, and technical support for all
kinds of research groups in the physical, engineering,
mathematical, biological, and social sciences.
We invite you to watch this space for more information
on available positions with the Theory Center. Any inquiries
should be directed to Alison Brown
{cmcl2,decvax,ihnp4,seismo}!cornell!alison
alison@cornell.arpa
alison@crnlthry.bitnet
or
Theory Center
Cornell University
265 Olin Hall
Ithaca, New York 14850