HELP! * GREEN=global GREY=local Global HTML version of Foils prepared July 9,1995

Foil 25 An Example to Illustrate Importance of Dual-Use Philosophy

From HPCS95 Keynote Presentation: HPC at the Crossroads Academic Niche or Economic Development Cornucopia HPCS95 Symposium -- July 10-12 Montreal Canada. by Geoffrey C. Fox * See also color IMAGE
A Real Example: Need a data-base system for a military vehicle which will remain nameless
  • In year X, evaluate civilian databases and find them wanting (too slow)
  • Design proprietary hardware and software using technologies of year X
  • Deliver system in year X+5 and find
    • Civilian microprocessors have increased in performance by a factor of 25 but there are no resources to adapt custom hardware and software to use these new civilian technologies
    • The multi-billion dollar civilian database industry has:
    • Increased database functionality adding object-oriented features
    • Ported database to latest microprocessors
    • Parallelized Database
Thus resultant system cannot be improved, is a factor of 100 slower than best civilian alternative, and DoD must pay contractor to maintain system for next 20 years
Northeast Parallel Architectures Center, Syracuse University, npac@npac.syr.edu

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