A PROPOSAL FOR BUILDING AN INTERACTIVE SOFTWARE SYSTEM FOR SCIENTIFIC COMPUTATION ON SUPERCOMPUTERS

THE SOFTWARE AVAILABLE FOR USE ON SUPERCOMPUTERS HAS PROVIDED NEITHER THE MOST SOPHISTICATED MATHEMATICAL TECHNIQUES AVAILABLE NOR A PARTICULARLY CONVENIENT WORKING ENVIRONMENT FOR THE APPLICATION PROGRAMMER. AS A RESULT, THE EXTREMELY SCARCE AND EXPENSIVE SUPERCOMPUTING CAPABILITYTHAT IS AVAILABLE IS NOT PRODUCING NEARLY THE VOLUME OF USEFUL WORK THAT IT COULD. SCIENTIFIC COMPUTING ASSOCIATES PROPOSES TO ADDRESS BOTH OF THESE LIMITATIONS OF CURRENT SUPERCOMPUTER SOFTWARE BY BUILDING A SOFTWARE ENVIRONMENT FOR COMPUTATION THAT IS INTERACTIVE, PORTABLE, EFFICIENT, AND UTILIZES STATE-OF-THE-ART ALGORITHMS FOR LARGE-SCALE NUMERICAL ANALYSIS TASKS. THIS SOFTWARE TOOL, WHICH WE CALLCLAM (THE COMPUTATIONAL LINEAR ALGEBRA MACHINE), IS PRESENTLY IMPLEMENTED IN A FORTRAN77 PROTOTYPE VERSION. IN THIS PROPOSAL, WE WILL OUTLINE THE CLAM'S CURRENT CHARACTERISTICS AND OUR PLANS FOR EXTENDING IT TO PROVIDE A RICH AND CONVENIENT MODELING AND SIMULATION ENVIRONMENT FOR THE ENTIRE RANGE OF COMPUTATIONALLY-DEMANDING APPLICATIONS.