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Microsoft Competes In Supercomputer Market
HoboMaster writes "Microsoft is releasing a public beta of Windows Compute Cluster Server 2003 in their first attempt to compete in the supercomputer OS market. Gates is planned to speak at the 2005 Supercomputer Conference, which will be Microsoft's first appearance at the conference. Gates, as always, has high hopes for this new version of Windows, even claiming it to be as powerful and easier to use than Linux."
Supercomputers aren't about "Ease of use." They're about speed per dollar. When WCC can beat Linux on price/performance, then people will stand up and take notice. Not before.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
I don't know what the "easy to use" argument precisely means in this arena. The people assembling and managing large clusters to produce supercomputers are in a significantly different league than your average MS-Word user. Not to poo-poo MS or anything, but Gates seems to have forgotten the audience in this case.
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In what way? It seems the two are equivalent- double click this icon to start a program. Menu bar over there for a list of all programs. Except Linux has a good text interface as well as the GUI. If anything, that gives the edge to Linux.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
It's hard to see how MS will gain much market penetration in this area unless it substantially alters its licensing. As I said in another post, "ease of use" isn't exactly going to be a big selling point for the guys putting these kinds of computers together, and OS licensing costs of $0.00 is hard to beat.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
he's actually claiming it's *as powerful* as linux!? why should that interest anyone, unless it's also as free?
even claiming it to be as powerful and easier to use than Linux.
I find Linux ease of use to be perfectly acceptable, and since they are not claiming better performance, I don't see an advantage.
Nothing says "Product of the Future" like the beta version of a product named "Windows Compute Cluster Server 2003".
Sure, they're doing it to maintain the "2003" branding of the flagship server. But why, less than two months before the end of 2005, are they not even trying to sound modern?
I have to say, I just don't think developers will go for it. First of all, if you're setting up a cluster of, say, 20 machines to run some MPI programs, you're going to be funneling some serious coin microsoft's way.
Secondly, I, like many developers, have been running MPI programs on Linux clusters for some time now. What's my incentive to switch? All I've got is penalties, like having to buy software and stuff. MPI is already free, open source software. So now MS sticks it in their OS and sell it as a new platform?
At least for me, this is too little, too late. I'll do what I've been doing, which is run my parallel code on Linux.
bottom line is, until microsoft can build this OS to be HUGELY FASTER than linux, there's no reason to pay extra for something that doesn't have any speed advantages.
i've never heard of the supercomputing crowd complaining about ease of use, they are looking for more calculations for less money, and for that linux/unix is probably still the best choice. there's no reason to pay thousands for an OS that doesn't increase your performance any further than an OS that costs $0
I'm sure Microsoft will do what it always does, and cheat.
Bill and Steve will see to it that a high-profile research centre (e.g. a university) will get a free supercomputer with a free Supercomputer Edition(TM) of Windows(TM) to play with and there will be much fanfare and positive publicity in the press.
Just like when SGI and intel gave NASA a free 10240-processor Altix (made of itanics).
Stick Men
When I worked at Microsoft, I specifically argued *against* getting involved in HPC markets. It isn't really an interesting market. It isn't a big market. And it never will be. If anything it will get smaller rather than bigger. Yes, there are some applications that are not going away but these are not common. After all how many customers does Cray have? How many customers does Microsoft have? Ok, you have the answer to my question. Heck, the ISP and web presence provider markets are more important to Microsoft strategically than HPC.
Indeed I cannot think of *any* reason why one would want Windows on an HPC cluster. Indeed, with Microsoft's reliance on COM and IPC stuff, I would be highly skeptical of using the Windows development environment in these cases. Yes, async I/O might be more mature on Windows, but I think that on the whole, Linux is a better choice.
As for the ease of use factor. This is a product that is really only needed by a few highly technical people. Ease of use for beginners is not important here. Ease of use by experienced UNIX admins is. Sadly Windows fails here pretty badly. After all not everyone needs to build a Beowulf cluster with licensed Windows software in their basement and the intensive number crunching apps that such clusters are used for are the exception rather than the rule.
Finally.....
Why not take Windows Server 2003 Standard or even XP Pro (for fewer than 10 nodes), install SFU 3.5 and PVM and build your cluster that way? It seems that this would be better for the market than this new product which seems to be the worst of both worlds.
This is just about saying "Anything Linux can do Windows can do better" rather than pursuing any reasonable business plan.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Imagine rebooting the complete cluster after installing software !!!
1. PHB sees Microsoft adverspamming for Windows Computer Cluster 2003, and believes the drivel. ...
2. PHB makes case to execs, gets capital for an 80-node WCC2K3 cluster for eleventy billion dollars, thanks to Licensing 7.
3. Admins shake their heads in disdain, get the thing running, and walk away.
4. Developers waste time and resources reinventing the wheel.
5. Nodes start to get rooted because the admins didn't harden the system.
6. Organized crime groups use nodes to DDoS websites in the name of extortion.
7.
8. Profit! (for Microsoft, at least).
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
The nonsense comments about the overhead of a GUI are retarded. Who cares if less than a fraction of 1% of my system is being used by something I don't care about? It simply doesn't matter.
However, there is no upside to a GUI. It offers a way for developers to write software that is difficult and time consuming to administer, and requires a much better connection for remote administration than ssh does. I have never found a single graphical tool that helps me admin anything, they are always a pain.
They bring very little value to the back end. A typical distributed app is not a rich UI client that needs lots of Windows APIs to play DRM'd movies, so Windows has no advantage there. It's a C, C++, or Fortan (mixed, even) job running MPI over some specialized interconnect hardware.
You also need a good parallel file system which I'm willing to go out on a limb and say that CIFS is probably not the optimal choice - any real system will probably be using a dedicated filer.
However, their strong suit in this space are tools like IDEs. If they can convince folks that using Windows as a front-end to development, then they can make some good inroads.
Right now the supercomputing folks are starting to get interested in Eclipse, and they're trying to head that off, not to mention small ISV's like us.
I can explanate how to administrate your network. You must configurate and segmentate it, so it can computate.
And even if MS were so compelled, what really is in it for Redmond? It's probably the smallest market in the world, with a customer base measured in the thousands, and one that already has access to either operating systems with a long multicomputing heritage or to clustered Linux systems that, for the kinds of guys that set up and maintain supercomputer clusters, offers no unreasonable difficulties as far as usability.
I think what we have here is Gates' inferiority complex towards Linux. He desperately wants to have MS in every market, and can't stand the thought of that open source demon increasingly being utilized, so he'll waste money on a product that, even if it were to be a success within that marketplace, would provide an outrageously small amount of revenue.
I suppose MS has money to burn, but if I had that much money to piss away, I'd try to take over the pocket calculator or security alarm markets.
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A standard line from Bill, "wait till you see Vista its better", "wait till you see compute its faster".
Amazingly the press continue to take Microsoft at face value on annoucing their version as better when they don't release what they announce.
So sure MS is better at supercomputers... I mean they have such a history in it, just look at the top 500 its just littered with MS boxes.
This isn't Windows v Linux, this is MS Research v IBM Research. The people behind the CPU, Relational databases, reliable messaging and of course the huge amount of work on massively scalable computers. If MS had real ability they'd be working with the big processing boys from the goverment and weather prediction areas.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
A lot of people seem to know better than the rest of us by saying that Microsoft is entering a business with too little, too late and God knows what.
Remember when Microsoft went to war with Sony and Nintendo? A lot of people said it was a dumb move and that Microsoft would basically get kicked out by Sony. Look what happened, now they seem to put Sony at risk. Instead of being behind, they're AHEAD.
I'm not a big MS fan but I hate it when people seem to neglect the fact that Microsoft is the biggest software company in the world because they've been doing the best job so far. Obviously, since they are in the lead. And please don't flame me on this one, I prefer Linux but I don't see my dad and my sister using Linux anytime soon.
Point is, Microsoft ain't going into this market without a serious plan.
Full Tilt
Security issues are irrelevant in a lot of cases. Scientific computing isn't done on computers attached to the internet...it is done on intranets consisting of specialized hardware streamlined for the needs of HPC. Most HPC programs don't even attach themselves to ethernet networks, but rather to things like Myrinet (bypass OS calls to reduce overhead GREATLY) that are intended for HPC. Being DDoS'd, or having a 'zombie cluster' etc are not really issues here.
I think the advantage of a MS solution might be ease-of-use, especially in server clusters that are up for hire (that is, up for timesharing). If you are some group performing research that requries lots of power but aren't focused in a CS-related field, you may not have the resources to go use the (often arcane) parallel (MPI) debuggers etc. and churn out a top-grade program for a supercomputer. An MS solution might indeed be cheaper OVERALL because of time-to-solution (time = money). Let's face it, VS.NET is a dream to code in - compared to other well-featured IDE's like Eclipse, it is light-weight, easier to use (Eclipse has major bloat issues), etc. So who knows - as the article mentions, it might indeed become part of an end-to-end scientific process, where the computational parts seamlessly fit in.
Furthermore, everyone who is talking about licenses per processor are not thinking properly...do you really think they would achieve penetration with the barrier to using the software so high? Of course not! Instead of speculating negatively, let's just wait and see what the licensing programs are when the product is released.
My 2 cents
>>When I bring hardware home, it works! Try getting those wireless usb devices working in Linux. Possible, sure! Do you just plug it in the slot and put in the CD and it works, not *even* close. Audio on Linux? You've got to be fucking kidding me. What fantasy world does the poster live in where Linux is easier to use than Windows?
What fantasy world do you live in where installing Windows and several additional third-party drivers is "easy"? At least with linux, you can generally avoid most of the driver installs -- they are included in the kernel, and are found automatically, but you might need to tweak a couple things before they work (or work perfectly). I'm amazed when I watch friends talk about Linux being difficult to use, meanwhile they'll spend hours reloading windows (and drivers, etc.) every couple months, if not more often.
More frustrating, if that's the right word, is that people complain about how "difficult" it is to research/make fixes for Linux, but don't even try to fix problems in Windows, opting for a reinstall instead. Kind of an apples and oranges thing, when you think about it.
Microsoft has just released their much anticipated hands-free cordless mouse. Warning, it may hurt a little at first.
Yeah, rendering, video editing and the other things Apple's xserve's don't need supercomputers.
Science and engineering are *not* the only places where supercomputers matter. You're just bias. Just watch the making of documentary for epIII of star wars, and look at all the shiny G5's hooked up to xserve's with awsome apple cinema display's. Science and engineering may be tilted heavily to windows and linux, but movie editing, 3d rendering etc are even more so geared to osx (well, not as much 3d rendering as movie editing but still)
Finally a slashdot story where no one can possible imagine a beowolf cluster of these.
- Prestige (branding)
- Research
For whatever Microsoft spends improving Windows so that it can be used on today's supercomputers, the benefits they will reap for their server and workstation lines could easily repay that investment. I'm not at all sure they can make a go of it, but if they succeed it will help them a lot more than just selling some licenses for big iron.Regardless of what the folks who actually use the supercomputer want, there's always this administrator who signs off on the purchase who will say 'Windows, huh? Great. Now we can have one support contract that covers everything!'. The M$ Sales Rep takes him/her out to a couple fancy lunches and comes back with a signed contract.
Uh, okay. You do realize super computers are EXTREMLY costly? There will always be enough experts out there to design an app for you. A scientist isn't likely going to write his own app for a super computer, he would hire someone that could make it work the best. A graphics designer isn't going to build their own distributed rendering software, they're going to get it made from someone else. Your fast car analogy is crap, because it's implying that Linux isn't usable. Just because you can't install it, doesn't mean someone who makes a living doing it can't. In fact, Linux is sooo much easier for something like this over windows it's insane. Only if you forget the fact it's impossible with Windows as it is. MS would be VERY hard pressed to beat Linux is the supercomputing market. Since it is open source, it's very flexible. You can get an entire system, with command line tools, on a floppy disk at around 600kb. Or you canget a run-off-the-cd or even DVD distro, like knoppix. All that and once you've figured thing's out, it's very easy! (Just read the online Linux-From-Scratch tutorials, you can literally take the source for apps, compile it, bootstrap and have your own custom OS as easy as pie)
There aren't going to be newer people who want to build supercomputers but refuse to learn Linux, because there are alrady so many that are linux proficent. If a CEO decides to make a supercomputer, he doesn't make it, he hire's someone. There are plenty of someones who know Linux. It'll be faster in Linux, and believe it or not programming an application in linux and dealing with open source API's is much easier than windows (what the hell is error: 0x432d423a supposed to mean?) so you get faster code and faster development. What advantage does windows offer?
Who cares if a supercomputer OS is easy to use? The only thing people that use supercomputers care about is speed. Other things supercomputer users care about is compiler efficiency (again for speed.) I don't see Visual Studio cranking out the efficient executables. I'm also quite sure the Joe Schmoe Ph.D in CS, CEE and Physics does not care if an eight year old can navagate the user interface. But he does care whether or not it takes the computer 2 weeks, or 3 months to model galaxy formation. Especially when he knows that there are 7 other teams that just got the same new information from the same conference and are all racing to publish their newest findings.
I think everyone here is missing the point.
This software is for biologists, chemists, and other scientists who don't have a damned clue what a shell script is, much less NFS, etc.
I work to support local users on a school supercomputer, and they don't have a clue of what's going on 90% of the time.
All they know is that they want software X run with parameter Y1-Y100 done Z number of times. They don't want to spend precious research time figuring out the computer systems.
This software is for a biologist who wants to buy a small cluster, plug it in, install his software, and run. No configuration, zero administration. Eliminating the need for the computer illiterate to have a sysadmin to run a cluster; THAT is the power of Microsoft's software.
That said, as a computer literate person, I wouldn't dream of installing Windows on a cluster; Linux and the OSG is the only way to go.
Microsoft aren't stupid or paranoid, or at least they can see what's bleedingly obvious, which is that Windows can't compete in the supercomputer space. Not now, but what of the future? CPU designers, with shrinking geometries, are running out of room to manoeuvre, so are looking to parallelism for future growth. Windows needs to get into the cluster space now, otherwise in 5 years time, they'll find themselves out of the market.
I do. This isn't microsoft's first try at this. I expect similar results
"Hex, Bugs, and Rockn'Roll"
A. Computers are becoming cheaper
B. Computers are generally replaced every ~4 years
C. People don't like throwing away something that they spent several hundred dollars on
What happens to the old computers that someone does't want to use? If Microsoft creates a any-idiot's solution for pluging those old boxes together to make a file server, web proxy, webpage hosting box... If there isn't a market for it now, there will be by the time this cluster OS is finished.
P.S. On the liscense comments: When Microsoft starts loosing customers because of their per processor liscense then it will be changed. They may not make the most solid software, but they know how to make money.
Yes, and my mom has been saying for the longest time how she wants to operate a supercomputer. Several mom and pops can now own and operate super computers too.
Again, i think the original writer was correct. Supercomputers are for enterprises and government agencies. Even some medium size businesses would have a cluster. But they all have a fulltime sys admin. And if the extent of that sys admins abilities is just a MCSE cert, then god help your company when the latest exploit hits.
Also, keep in mind that if this is using a Windows interface (rather than a shell prompt), it is using easily 3X the resources that a Linux machine without X-windows installed would.
Finally, since when has a first version of of any Microsoft product worked great?? There is a reason why everyone waits til the third edition to really adopt a Microsoft product. But in this case, they are fighting an uphill battle against something that is more scalable, faster, more stable and cheaper by far. Plus it's been tested time and time again.
If Windows could handle the load (and if Microsoft was worth it's salt as an server OS), they would stop using Linux to do all their load bearing. The day Windows cluster appears in the top 10 supercomputers is the day George Bush comes out of the closet, marries Dick Cheney and decides to become an atheist.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
If Windows wants to get in the HPC market, they should start by offering a fortran compiler. Lahey has one for Windows, but for a native UNIX user, the instructions on how to use it on Windows were just about incomprehensible. Strangely, for HPC, Linux, AIX and other UNIX systems are probably much easier to use. And I doubt windows binaries would be as fast anyhow.
This stuff is marketed to the people who say:
Our windows-based programs are too slow. Don't tell me we need to go to programs that are written more efficiently, or that there would be an overall cheaper and superior non-windows-based alternative: I don't want to hear it. Change frightens me. Just give me more power.
I see this mentality all the time. Here's an example from school I remember. This one student would sit and take up multiple windows computers in the computer room to run Matlab. He did this for months.
Did he want to hear that he could invest some time and recode in a fully compiled language and come out way ahead in terms of time? No. Did he want to recode to knock off alot of the computing in a very short time using the school's Linux cluster? No. Did he want to take his heaviest subroutines, write them in a compiled language, and call them from Matlab to speed up his calculations dramatically? No. Did he want to know how to rewrite his Matlab code to maximize vectorization and computation efficiency? No.
He just wanted to throw more power behind what he was comfortable with.
People will buy this stuff.
he is comparing windows to linux on super computers? ..
so if i want to make a super computer cluster of say 10,000 pcs i immediately have an added cost called the microsoft tax of a minimum of $100. or 10,000,000 usd
am i right?
"Gates, as always, has high hopes for this new version of Windows, even claiming it to be as powerful and easier to use than Linux." You mean, Windows is becoming even worse now? I thought he usually claimed, Windows is far superiour to just about everything out there.
To give an idea, 128 nodes will give you at most 512 processors (more becomes EXTREMELY inefficient). 512 processors will net you a place between 300 and 500 on the current top 500 list. This will be very different on the list to be released six months for now... such small clusters might not even show up.
Then there is the user group of HPC systems. It is a VERYsmall market, with a userbase, a group of anministrators and a group of manufacturers traditionally used to UNIX, and now migrating to Linux in droves. Windows is not even duscussed. The announcement of the Windows Compute Cluster edition was cause for great hilarity at the workplace, where jokes like parallel word/excel and high-performance visual basic started floating around. No one will take Microsoft serious in that market.
Perhaps Microsoft will sell some systems to some manufacturers, like in the automotive or pharmaceutical industry. But these guys already know the ways to traditional vendors selling them Linux clusters, vendors like SGI for instance. CHeck the SGI Manufacturing page.
So... will Microsoft compete? So far, they announced an operating system for clusters. Important questions remain:
- Will the OS run headless?
- What low latency networks will be supported?
- Are MPI and OpenMP implementations available?
- what about remote management, remote login and remote copy? (On a side note: why is it that Windows 2003 can't have simple stuff like ssh and scp built in?)
- what applications will be available?
I have to wait and see... i don't expect anything substantial to happen... and if Microsoft does this for prestige, they are wasting their money. -