December 18, 1996
Geoffrey C. Fox
gcf@npac.syr.edu
http://www.npac.syr.edu
Northeast Parallel Architectures Center
111 College Place
Syracuse University
Syracuse, New York 13244-4100
We propose that Petaflops programming requires two key components. The first is research into new approaches to software and algorithms, which can handle memory hierarchy, latency and bandwidth, and its relation to machine and application geometric structure. This alone will not lead to a user-friendly programming environment. Here, we suggest a sophisticated Web technology-based ``new generation'' system supporting convenient flexible access to high-performance runtime libraries written in Fortran, C++, and Java.
Note, we only discuss a few issues - in particular, languages and overall environment. Other critical areas, such as tools, are not discussed.