Concluding Remarks
First, if we look back to the meeting in 1983, we see that the high-performance computing environment today is much more complex. Before, we could look at individual boxes. Largely because of the reasons that I mentioned, it's now a distributed system. To have an effective environment today, the whole system has to work. All the elements have to be at roughly the same level of performance if there is to be a balanced system. Therefore, the problem has become much more complex and the solution more effective.
To continue high-performance computing advances, it seems clear from the meeting that we need to establish effective mechanisms to coordinate our activities. Any one individual, organization, or company can only work on a piece of the whole environment. To have those pieces come together so that you don't have square plugs for round holes, some coordination is required. How to do that is a sociological, political, and cultural problem. It is at least as difficult, and probably rather more so, than the technical problems.
Next, as I alluded to before, high-performance computing as a business will live or die—and this is a quote from one of the speakers—according to its acceptance by private industry. The market is currently too small, too fragmented, and not growing at a rapid enough rate to remain operable. Increasing the user base is imperative. Each individual and organization should take as a challenge how we can do that. To some extent, we're the apostles. We believe , and we know what can be done, but most of the world does not.
Finally, let me look ahead. In my opinion, there's a clear federal role in high-performance computing. This role includes, but is not limited to, (1) education and training, (2) usage of high performance for agency needs, (3) support for R&D, and (4) technology cooperation with industry. This is not transfer; it goes both ways. Let's not be imperialistic.
The federal role in these and other areas will be a strong motivator and enabler to allow us to achieve the vision discussed during this meeting. It was made clear over and over again that the federal presence has been a leader, driver, catalyst, and strong influence on the development of the high-performance computing environment to date. And if this environment is to succeed, the federal presence has to be there in the future.
We cannot forget the challenge from our competitors and the fact that if we do not take on this challenge and succeed with it, there are others who will. The race is won by the fleet, and we need to be fleet.