national computational science alliance knowledge management and corporate intranets talk to...

National Computational Science Alliance

Knowledge Management and Corporate Intranets

• Talk to visiting team from Fisher Scientific

• January 13, 1998


The Alliance National Technology Grid


NSF vBNS and PACI - Mutually Interdependent

NPACI

NCSA Alliance

Both NCSA Alliance and NPACI

Other High Performance Connection sites

Current vBNS “Backbone” sites


Alliance Applications Technologies Teams - Science and Engineering Driving the Grid

• Cosmology (5)• Environment Hydrology (11)• Chemical Engineering (7)• Bioinformatics (9)• Nanomaterials (11)• Scientific Instruments (8)


NCSA Biology Workbench - Web Interface to Programs and to Data

• Wide International User Community – http://biology.ncsa.uiuc.edu/

• Available Commercially as:– The Bioinformatics Workbench– MDL Information Systems

– http://www.mdli.com/bioinformatics/welcome.html


I-Way ‘95 - Distributed Use of Scientific Instruments


How to Find out More About the Alliance

See also http://alliance.ncsa.uiuc.edu


NCSA Industrial Partners

• Allstate Insurance Co.• Boeing Company• Caterpillar Inc.• Eastman Kodak Co.• Eli Lilly and Company• FMC Corporation• Ford Motor Company• J. P. Morgan

• Motorola, Inc.• Phillips Petroleum Co.• SABRE Group, Inc.• Schlumberger• Sears, Roebuck & Co.• Shell Oil Company• Tribune Company


NCSA’s Three Major Technology Foci

• Scalable Computing– Clustered Computing Architectures

– Evolution to NT/Intel

• Knowledge Management– Enterprise Intranets & Decision Support

– Automated Discovery & Learning

• Virtual Environments– Desktop to CAVE

– Tele-immersion


Exponential Cascade:From Leading Edge to Consumer Electronics

1985 Cray X-MP

Cost:$8,000,000

60,000 watts of power

No Built in Graphics

56 kbps NSFnet Backbone

1997 Nintendo 64

Cost: $149

5 watts of power

Interactive 3D Graphics

64 kbps ISDN to Home

Source: Silicon Graphics, 1997


Exponential Growth in National User Demand Will Drive Grid Capabilities

Source: Quantum Research Database


Three Architectures for High End Computing

• Clusters of DSM– SGI Origin2000 UNIX DSMs

– HP Exemplar UNIX DSM

• Clusters of SMPs– SGI Power Challenge UNIX SMPs

– HP and Compaq NT/Intel SMPs

• Networks of Computers– UWisc. Condor for UNIX Workstations

– NCSA Symbio for NT Desktops

NCSA FY98


World’s Largest Unclassified SGI/Cray Origin - NCSA’s Cluster of DSMs

Power Challenge Array

Origin Array

128

4x64

4x32

10x16

Processors

128 Processors Equals a 512 Processor CM-5


Computing on the University of Wisconsin Condor Pool

Condor Cycles

CondorView, Courtesy of Miron Livny, Todd Tannenbaum(UWisc)


How Did a Supercomputer Center Get Into Enterprise Knowledge Management?

• Microprocessor Market Convergence– NT/Intel Challenging UNIX/RISC

• Desktop Software Tool Development– From NCSA Telnet to NCSA Mosaic

• Large Scientific Databases– From Scientific Visualization to Info Viz

• Emergence of Distributed Object Architecture– Java, ActiveX, CORBA, and the Web

• Supercomputer Center to PACI– Need to Create Alliance Intranet and Collaboratory


The Coming Integration of Technical and Commercial Computing

• The Emergence of High Performance Commercial Computing– Computational Knowledge Management– Focus on:

– Large Data Sets and Information Visualization– AI Techniques for Data Mining– Optimization and Decision Support– Financial “Rocket Science”

• NT / UNIX Interoperability and Scalability– HP and SGI UNIX DSMs– Scalable Microsoft NT Clusters and NCSA Symbio– HP/Intel Merced Processor in FY99-00


NCSA / Alliance NT Projects

• NCSA Microsoft Intranet– Internet Explorer 4.0 and Office 97– Active Desktop (ActiveX & Push Technologies)– NT 5.0 (Active Directory, Kerberos, Dfs)

• NT/UNIX Interoperability Testbed– HP NT Pentium Pro Classroom & NT/UNIX Servers– UNIX Programming Environment on NT PC

• Computing on NT Network– NCSA Symbio and Univ. of Wisconsin Condor

• NT Cluster Scalability– Microsoft Wolfpack– Tightly Coupled SMP Clusters (Chien / Iyer)


Allstate Pioneering an NT Intranet

• Standard Software Environment– Microsoft Office

– Microsoft Outlook / Exchange

– Internet Explorer

– Windows NT Desktop / Server for Intel Platforms

– Oracle Database Technology– CA Unicenter (TNG)

• TCP/IP Network– T3 Backbone– Sonet Ring Technology

• Partnering with NCSA as Microsoft / HP Testbed• Partnering with NCSA and Computer Associates


Performance Monitoring and Capacity Planning

• Efficient Usage of the Resources

• Performance Data Collection

• Automated Analysis to Ensure Service Levels

• Workloads Management– Load Balancing

– Scheduling

– Remote Collaboration Sessions

• Capacity Planning Tools and Models


The Alliance Intranet - Support for a Virtual Organization

• Browser Interface Augmented by Java

• Threaded Discussion Spaces

• Federated Repository of Documents– Backended by Lotus Domino

– Alliance Work Statements

– Alliance Power Points

• Administrative Tools– Contacts

– Calendar

• Individualized Security Profiles


The Emergence of Knowledge Management

October 20, 1997


NCSA Knowledge Management Workspaces

AgentsORBs (CORBA / ActiveX )

ScriptingJavaBeans / Enterprise Objects

Java / Smalltalk

Distributed Object Technology

Simulation Engine

Optimization Tools

Object and Relational Databases

Data Warehouses

SGI Mineset

AVS, VDI Automated Discovery

Collections

Analysis

Optimization

Knowledge Discovery and Visualization

Collaborations (Habanero, Tango)

VRML Browser

CAVE Devices

Application Specific Browser


Visual Data Mining of Total Insurance Claims Dataset

Allstate Insurance, NCSA Using SGI Mineset


Alliance Researchers Using a Digital VideoComputational Infrastructure

= Digital Video Streams

Digital VideoServer

Internet, vBNS

Habanero Teams

Create Digital Video Animation Concurrently with Supercomputing

CAVE Virtual Director

Individual Desktops

Desktop VideoTeleconferencing


Alliance National Technology GridWorkshop and Training Facilities

Powered by Silicon GraphicsLinked by the NSF vBNS


Caterpillar’s Distributed Virtual Reality

Data courtesy of Valerie Lehner, NCSA, 1996


Bringing Scientific / Information Visualization & Virtual Environments to the NT Desktop

• Early Partner with SGI NT Supergraphics– Port CAVE to NT

– Work with Alias/Wavefront on NT

• VRML and Java3D– Compatible with CAVE Libraries

– Develop Specific Applets

– Integration with Collaborative Environments

• Work with AVS, VDI, and other Third Party

• Partner with Graphics Team at Microsoft