NPAC Technical Report SCCS-736
Basic Issues and Current Status of Parallel Computing
Geoffrey Fox
Submitted September 1 1995
Abstract
We describe the state of parallel computing in 1995. The technological
driving force is the increasing performance of VLSI chips. This leads
to nodes which can be joined together in several different
architectures to provide powerful machines leading to teraflop
performance in 1996 and petaflops 20 years later. This is put in the
context of the federal HPCC initiative. We describe the analogies with
society and discuss illustrative applications. Basic architecture
principles -- vector supercmputers, SIMD, MIMD, (distributed) shared
memory and clustered computers (metacomputers) -- are presented
and contrasted. On the software side, parallel operating systems and both
data parallel and message passing programming environments are briefly
reviewed. The trend from Grand to National challenges is noted.