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Linux Claims 4 of the Top 5 Supercomputer Spots
Anonymous Coward writes to tell us that the November 2005 list of supercomputers has been published. Certainly something to note is that four of the top five use linux. Relatedly Multiflow writes "CNET is reporting that the number of supercomputers on the Top500 list which use Intel Itanium 2 microprocessors has fallen by almost 50% in the past year. While new higher performance Itanium chips are in the pipeline, the article reports that 64 bit Xeons and Opterons have increased their representation on Top500."
These aren't off the shelf desktops.
What else would you expect them to run, windows ME?
perpetually dwelling in the -1 pits
Where, exactly, did you get the information that these systems "run linux?"
In the Blue/Gene system, for example, the user front-end nodes use linux, but the OS for the system itself is very definitely NOT linux. So acting as if the system runs off a linux kernel is misleading, to say the very least!
Fairly good question. I'm not sure where you start calling something a "computer" and where you fall off into the grey area of "computational network" or "cluster" or "grid computing system." After all, isn't SETI@Home a pretty massive computer? By some (very loose) definition it should be.
I think most people consider a computer to be something that, at some level, runs a single operating system (which then can abstract other OSes on top of itself), or perhaps is capable of addressing a single logical range of main memory (although this might not be a good definition either).
I haven't read the article yet to see if they give their definition, but it does seem as if the line between 'this is a computer' and 'this is a bunch of computers working together' is fairly blurry, and perhaps where one draws it is completely arbitrary.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Well, if Sony hadn't went off and got caught they would have the largest supercomputer and it would be running Microsft Windows!
Looking at this chart http://www.top500.org/lists/2005/11/l/Operating_Sy stem it actually appears that the OS ran on all system are:
- Linux: 72.2%
- Max OS: 1.0%
- Others 4.4%
- UNIX and Linux: everything else (~22%)
So it appears that Linux/UNIX* runs on about 95% of all super computers. The Story headline should have been:
Linux Claims Almost All Supercomputers Spots
What a scoop.
*Linux,UNIX, what's the difference really?
While this will not do much to encourage the Unwashed Masses to embrace Linux, it certainly shows that Linux is a serious operating system suited to high-powered computing (or at least to hosting high-powered computing applications). I hope at least a few Fortune 500 CIOs will take notice.
Actually, it doesn't show that at all. Supercomputing is a very specialised niche use of hardware. Generally, this sort of software wants the operating system to get out of the way as much as possible and allow the fastest possible access to memory and processors and (depending on the situation) I/O systems. In the past major supercomputer applications have required very little operating system functionality to back them up.
There is little comparison between specialised numerical supercomputing and general multi-processor mainframe use, which requires concurrent multiuser access to app servers, general filesystems, databases etc. This is where older OSes such as IBM operating systems and Solaris work very well, and where Linux is now making inroads.
It is rather like comparing a formula one racing car to a truck. I agree that Linux is suited to both purposes, but working well in one environment does not indicate usefulness in another.
In fact, here is the most relevent passage from the article:
There's probably at least two camps of Linux users, based on their belief on whether marketshare is important or not. I'm somewhere in the middle.
On the one extreme is people who don't give a rat's ass if other people use it or not, or at least say this. On the other extreme is people who want global domination.
The problem with the first extreme is that for the whole open-source concept to work, you have to have a critical mass of users so that you have a large enough base of developers (which are a subset of the users) to keep the project working. Since most open-source software isn't owned by corporations (though some is certainly supported to some extent by them), open-source requires a large number of users to help work on the various projects.
The problem with the other extreme is that, in order to make Linux (as a group of distributions) a viable choice for all current Windows users, certain concessions and changes might have to be made, such as providing an API for closed-source drivers, removing features from the most popular software because it's "too flexible" for many users, standardizing on one desktop (GNOME or KDE), etc. Many powerful people in the open-source community don't like these things, and it's quite debatable whether they might end up hurting or destroying the open-source movement instead of helping it. (For instance, if it became easy to distribute closed-source drivers, then while Linux might become more popular initially, it might suffer from the same problem as Windows where companies release crappy drivers for their hardware, which makes Linux systems unreliable, and the companies refuse to help any open-source driver efforts).
Personally, I don't want Linux to become a commercialized, closed-source OS with a few open-source bits, but all the important stuff closed as some companies are trying to do. I also don't care if "Aunt Tillie" uses it, as long as she doesn't ask me for free support for her Windows computer, so I don't really care about it becoming the dominant OS. What I do want is for it to gain enough marketshare so that it's taken seriously, most hardware is supported on it (by open-source drivers), most worthwhile application software is ported to it, and that there's enough business in it that the dominant distros can make very polished versions without any major shortcomings like we still see today. In a nutshell, I want to be able to use Linux at work and at home to do anything I need to do (including buying and using the latest TurboTax or AutoCAD, for instance), without ever running into any major problems because I don't use Windows. If Linux reached 50% marketshare, this dream would probably be realized. The Windows users could happily live with their BSODs, activations, client-access licenses, high license prices, etc., and me and the other Linux users could happily ignore all that crap without being hindered because some web site is "optimized" for IE, TurboTax doesn't have a Linux version, ATI cards have crap drivers for Linux, etc.
Already, we're getting fairly close: certain types of hardware still have serious driver problems (video cards and WLAN adaptors), most lower-end commercial software does not have a Linux version (although much high-end software, such as that by MentorGraphics, Cadence, etc., does), and we still have serious problems with non-HTML-compliant websites. But on the plus side, we have a very reliable kernel and OS, we have very functional desktop environments (GNOME and KDE, and apps from one will work in the other), we have tons of free software to satisfy most of your needs both on the server and the desktop, and we have tons of drivers for most popular and also much older and obscure hardware. We're at the point now where you can get a recent Linux distro and install it, easily and quickly, on the hardware of your choice, and probably not run into any problems at all. You'll get tons of included software (web browsers, CD burners, word processors, etc.), and be able to do just about anything you reasonably need to do with a computer, unless perhaps your raison d'etre is to play all the latest 3D PC games.
Note that I/O nodes and not "front-end" nodes. All the front-end machines (there are many) run Linux as well.
All the user-level stuff (the programming model, tools, compilers, etc) is standard Linux, too.
So, is it Linux?
[Disclaimer: I have worked on some system aspects of the beast, but this post is not sanctioned by BG/L team or IBM or LLNL. I am not disclosing anything proprietary here - all this is open info that can be found in many papers on the subject. Check out IBM Journal of R&D for a wealth of information.