Executive Summary

The IEEE Computer Society Task Force on Cluster Computing (TFCC) has been in existence since early in February 1999. In its short life the TFCC has started to have an impact on the cluster computing research and development community in both academia and industry. Some evidence of this can be seen by the numbers influential people willing to get involved in the TFCC activities. Furthermore, the number of TFCC-based events and numbers of willing volunteers prepared to promote our activities all provide ample evidence that the TFCC is not only being successful, but also having an impact on the community

One particularly successful TFCC activity has been our cluster computing educational programme. Here we are attempting to promote the inclusion of cluster computing and its related technologies in the core curriculum of universities around the world. Our efforts in this area also include a book donation programme. In conjunction with influential international authors and publishers we have donated more than 250 books to academic institutions around the world.

The TFCC is also starting to co-organize and sponsor a number of technical events in addition to its own annual event. The first annual (International Workshop on Cluster Computing - IWCC99) event is scheduled to be held in early December 1999, Melbourne, Australia.

• Canada http://www.cs.yorku.ca/~hsandhu/tfcc
• Europe http://www.tu-chemnitz.de/informatik/RA/cchp/index.html
• Japan http://pdswww.rwcp.or.jp/TFCC/
• Middle-East http://members.tripod.com/h_s_shahhoseini/tfcc-mid-east.htm
• South America http://www.cos.ufrj.br/~ricardo/tfcc.html
• Taiwan http://www.cs.nthu.edu.tw/~king/tfcc/

1. Greg Pfister has requested Prentice Hall to donate 25 copies of his book: In Search of Clusters, 2nd Edition, Prentice Hall PTR, NJ, 1998.

2. Barry Wilkinson has requested Prentice Hall to donate 25 copies of his book: Parallel Programming Techniques and Applications Using Networked Workstations and Parallel Computers, by Barry Wilkinson and Michael Allen, Prentice Hall, 1999.

3. Wolfgang Gentzsch has requested Elsevier Publisher to donate 25 copies FGCS Special Issue on Metacomputing. The Special Issue will appear in October, 1999, and contains a collection of 23 contributions about metacomputing architectures, building blocks and applications.

4. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers (US) would like to donate books that may be of interest to the educational community involved in cluster computing (TFCC members): Please select book(s) of your interest from: http://www.mkp.com/books_catalog/areas/parallel_distributed.asp Then fill out the form located at: http://www.mkp.com/orders/exam_form.htm OR directly contact Pamela J. Olheiser (polheiser@mkp.com) by email.

5. Baltzer Science Publishers is happy to announce the donation of up to 40 copies of Cluster Computing Journal http://www.baltzer.nl/cluster/cluster.asp. TFCC members (preferably faculty members) interested in a copy of the Cluster Computing Journal, should contact: Ms. Monika Grobecker ( mgro@genias.de).

   TFCC members may obtain on-line subscriptions to Cluster Computing Journal at a low-cost of $40. Members should fill in the order form at http://www.baltzer.nl/cluster/cluster.order.html and mention being a "TFCC member". Only individual non-library subscriptions allowed.

6. The SCI Working Group (SCIWG) offers 50 copies of the book SCI - Scalable Coherent Interface: Architecture and Software for High-Performance Compute Clusters by Hermann Hellwagner and Alexander Reinefeld (eds). Springer State-of-the-Art Surveys LNCS 1734, 1999. ISBN 3-540-66696-6.

   The donation is sponsored by the ESRPIT Network of Excellence, Working Group 22582 (SCIWG). Thanks to Wolfgang Karl, TUM, for making the donation possible. For book requests, please send an email to Mrs. Petra Fehlhauer, fehlhauer@zib.de with your complete postal address.

Thanks, Greg Pfister, Barry Wilkinson, Wolfgang Gentzsch, Alexander Reinefeld and Wolfgang Karl for your support of the TFCC Education Promotion Program. We would also like to thank the publishers Baltzer Science Publishers, Elsevier Publisher, Morgan Kaufmann and Prentice Hall for their donations.

If you are interested in using any of the above books or issues in your course, please contact TFCC Co-Chair Rajkumar Buyya.

Conference Announcements

• 1st IEEE Computer Society International Workshop on Cluster Computing (IWCC'99) in conjunction with PART '99
  Melbourne, Australia, December 2 , 1999
  Sponsored by the IEEE Computer Society, through the Task Force on Cluster Computing (TFCC)
  URL: http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/tfcc/IWCC99/

• Eleventh IASTED International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Computing and Systems (PDCS'99)
  Cambridge, MA, USA, November 3-6, 1999
  Sponsor: The International Association of Science and Technology for Development (IASTED)
  URL: http://www.iasted.com/conferences/1999/boston/pdcs.htm

• Applications and Enabling Technologies for Cluster Computing
  Special Session at 6th International Conference on High Performance Computing (HiPC'99)
  December 17-20, 1999, Calcutta, India
  Cosponsored by: IEEE Computer Society Technical Committee on Parallel Processing ACM SIGARCH, Indian Statistical Institute, Calcutta
  URL: http://www.hipc.org/hipc99/clustercfp.txt

• International Parallel and Distributed Processing Symposium 2000 (IPDPS 2000),
  Cancun, Mexico, May 1-5, 2000
  Sponsors: IEEE Computer Society Technical Committee on Parallel Processing
  URL: http://www.ippsxx.org

• The 2000 International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Processing Techniques and Applications (PDPTA'2000), June 26 - 29, 2000, Monte Carlo Resort, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
  URL: http://www.cps.udayton.edu/faculty/pan/pdpta

• Euro-Par 2000 Cluster Computing Workshop as part of European Parallel Computing Conference (Euro-Par 2000) 29 August to 1 September 2000, Munich, Germany
  URL: http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/EuroParCluster2000/

• IEEE International Conference on Cluster Computing (CLUSTER 2000) Technische Universität Chemnitz, Saxony, Germany, November 28 - December 2, 2000
  URL: http://www.tu-chemnitz.de/informatik/RA/cluster2000/index.htm

• ACM 2000 Java Grande Conference Sponsored by ACM SIGPLAN, San Francisco, California, June 3-4, 2000 URL: http://www.extreme.indiana.edu/java00

Call for Papers - Conferences

• HPC ASIA 2000, The Fourth International Conference/Exhibition on High-Performance Computing in Asia-Pacific Region
  May 14-17, 2000, Beijing, China
  URL: http://www.cs.wm.edu/hpcs/HPCAsia2000.htm

  Contributed Papers Due: EXTENDED to November 15, 1999 (was October 25)
  

• 5th Workshop on Optics and Computer Science (WOCS) held in conjunction with IPDPS 2000, Cancun, Mexico, May 1-5, 2000
  Submission deadline: 20 November 1999
  URL: http://ww.eecis.udel.edu/~kiamilev/wocs2000/

• 3rd international workshop PC-NOW 2000 held in conjunction with IPDPS 2000, Cancun, Mexico, May 1-5, 2000
  Submission deadline: 15 October 1999
  URL:http://www.disi.unige.it/person/ChiolaG/pcnow00/

• 9th Heterogeneous Computing Workshop (HCW 2000) held in conjunction with IPDPS 2000, Cancun, Mexico, May 1-5, 2000
  Submission deadline: 8 October 1999
  URL: http://myrtle.cs.umanitoba.ca/hcw

• Eighth International Workshop on Parallel and Distributed Real-Time Systems (WPDRTS 2000) held in conjunction with IPDPS 2000, Cancun, Mexico, May 1-5, 2000
  Submission deadline: 15 November 1999 - extended to 1 DECEMBER 1999
  URL: http://csci.uark.edu/~aapon/wpdrts2000/

• High-Performance Computing with Linux Platforms (HPC Linux 2000) in conjunction with HPC-ASIA 2000, May 14-17, 2000, Beijing, China
  Submission deadline: 15 November 1999
  URL: http://www.csis.hku.hk/~clwang/HPCLinux2000.html

• Asia-Pacific Symposium on Cluster Computing (APSC 2000) in conjunction with HPCAsia2000, May 14-17, 2000, Beijing, China
  Submission deadline: 30 October 1999 - extended to 15 November 1999
  URL: http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/apscc2000/

• The 2000 International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Processing Techniques and Applications (PDPTA'2000), June 26 - 29, 2000, Monte Carlo Resort, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
  Submission deadline: 28 February 2000
  URL: http://www.cps.udayton.edu/faculty/pan/pdpta

• Workshop on Cluster Computing for Internet Applications (CCIA2000) in conjunction with The 7th IEEE International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Systems (ICPADS'2000) at Iwate Prefectural University, Iwate, Japan, July 4-7, 2000.
  Submission deadline: 31 December 1999
  URL: http://www.cs.nthu.edu.tw/~king/CCIA2000.html

• International Workshop on Distributed Real-Time Systems (IWDRS) in conjunction with The 20th International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS 2000) Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China, April, 10 - 13, 2000
  Submission deadline: 1 December 1999
  URL: http://calab.kaist.ac.kr/Conf/IWDRS2000

• European Parallel Computing Conference (Euro-Par 2000) 29 August to 1 September 2000, Munich, Germany
  Submission deadline: 31 January 2000
  URL: http://wwwbode.in.tum.de/~europar/

• Euro-Par 2000 Cluster Computing Workshop as part of European Parallel Computing Conference (Euro-Par 2000) 29 August to 1 September 2000, Munich, Germany
  Submission deadline: 31 January 2000
  URL: http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/EuroParCluster2000/

• Cluster Computing Technologies, Environments, and Applications (CC-TEA) at 2000 International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Processing Techniques and Applications (PDPTA 2000) 26 - 29 June 2000, Monte Carlo Resort, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
  Submission deadline: 28 February 2000
  URL: http://ceng.usc.edu/~hjin/cc-tea2000.html

• High Performance Computing in Chem-, Bio- and Medical Informatics special session at 2000 International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Processing Techniques and Applications (PDPTA'2000), June 26 - 29, 2000 Monte Carlo Resort, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
  Submission Deadline: 10 March 2000
  Contact: Zina Ben Miled
  URL: http://compeng1.sl.iupui.edu/callfor.htm

• IEEE International Conference on Cluster Computing (CLUSTER 2000) Technische Universität Chemnitz, Saxony, Germany, November 28 - December 2, 2000
  Submission deadline: 7 June 2000
  URL: http://www.tu-chemnitz.de/informatik/RA/cluster2000/index.htm

• ACM 2000 Java Grande Conference Sponsored by ACM SIGPLAN San Francisco, California, June 3-4, 2000
  Submission deadline: 10 January 2000
  URL: http://www.extreme.indiana.edu/java00

• 3rd International Conference on SCI-based Technology and Research (SCI-Europe 2000) held in conjunction with The European Conference on Parallel Computing (Euro-Par 2000) Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany, August 29th-30th, 2000
  Papers due: 1 March 2000
  URL: http://wwwbode.informatik.tu-muenchen.de/events/scieurope2000/index.html

Call for Papers - Journals

• Special Issue on Industrial Applications of Parallel Computing in the International Journal of Computer Research
  Special Issue Editors: Marcin Paprzycki, Luciano Tarricone and Tianruo Yang.
  URL: http://www.softlab.ntua.gr/~mastor/IJCR.htm
  

  Paper submission September 15th, 1999
  Final papers due December 31st, 1999

• Unconventional Parallel Architectures special issue of Parallel and Distributed Computing Practices
  Editors: Yakov I. Fet and Peter Kacsuk
  Paper due September 1, 1999
  

• Advances in Parallel and Distributed Simulation special issue in Parallel and Distributed Computing Practices (PDCP) a journal published by Nova Science Books.
  Editor: Carl Tropper
  Paper due December 15, 1999
  

• Java on Clusters special issue of the Journal of Parallel Distributed Computing
  Editor: Eliezer Dekel
  Paper due November 15, 1999
  

Special Issues on Cluster Computing in Journals

• Parallel Computing on Networks of Computers
  special issue of Informatica: an International Journal of Computing and Informatics, Vol. 23 No. 1, 1999.
  Edited by Rajkumar Buyya and Marcin Paprzycki
  URL: http://ai.ijs.si/informatica/

Workshops

• 1st IEEE Computer Society International Workshop on Cluster Computing (IWCC'99) in conjunction with PART '99
  Melbourne, Australia, December 2 , 1999
  Sponsored by the IEEE Computer Society, through the Task Force on Cluster Computing (TFCC)
  URL: http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/tfcc/IWCC99/

• Workshop on Cluster Computing
  part of HPC ASIA 2000, The Fourth International Conference/Exhibition on High-Performance Computing in Asia-Pacific Region
  May 14-17, 2000, Beijing, China
  

  Chair: Rajkumar Buyya
  URL: http://ceng.usc.edu/~hjin/apscc2000/

• 5th International Workshop on High-Level Parallel Programming Models and Supportive Environments (HIPS 2000) held in conjunction with IPDPS 2000, Cancun, Mexico, May 1st, 2000
  URL: http://wwwbode.in.tum.de/events/hips2000/

• 5th Workshop on Optics and Computer Science (WOCS) held in conjunction with IPDPS 2000, Cancun, Mexico, May 1-5, 2000
  URL: http://ww.eecis.udel.edu/~kiamilev/wocs2000/

• 3rd international workshop PC-NOW 2000 held in conjunction with IPDPS 2000, Cancun, Mexico, May 1-5, 2000
  URL:http://www.disi.unige.it/person/ChiolaG/pcnow00/

• 9th Heterogeneous Computing Workshop (HCW 2000) held in conjunction with IPDPS 2000, Cancun, Mexico, May 1-5, 2000
  URL: http://myrtle.cs.umanitoba.ca/hcw

• Eighth International Workshop on Parallel and Distributed Real-Time Systems (WPDRTS 2000) held in conjunction with IPDPS 2000, Cancun, Mexico, May 1-5, 2000
  URL: http://csci.uark.edu/~aapon/wpdrts2000/

• High-Performance Computing with Linux Platforms (HPC Linux 2000) in conjunction with HPC-ASIA 2000, May 14-17, 2000, Beijing, China
  URL: http://www.csis.hku.hk/~clwang/HPCLinux2000.html

• Asia-Pacific Symposium on Cluster Computing (APSC 2000) in conjunction with HPCAsia2000, May 14-17, 2000, Beijing, China
  URL: http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/apscc2000/

• Workshop on Cluster Computing for Internet Applications (CCIA2000) in conjunction with The 7th IEEE International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Systems (ICPADS'2000) at Iwate Prefectural University, Iwate, Japan, July 4-7, 2000.
  URL: http://www.cs.nthu.edu.tw/~king/CCIA2000.html

• International Workshop on Distributed Real-Time Systems (IWDRS) in conjunction with The 20th International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS 2000) Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China, April, 10 - 13, 2000
  URL: http://calab.kaist.ac.kr/Conf/IWDRS2000

• Euro-Par 2000 Cluster Computing Workshop as part of European Parallel Computing Conference (Euro-Par 2000) 29 August to 1 September 2000, Munich, Germany
  URL: http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/EuroParCluster2000/

Tutorials

• Java and High Performance Computing given at Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS-32), Hawaii, USA, January 5-8, 1999.
  http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/javahpc.html

Book Announcements

• High Performance Cluster Computing: Architectures and Systems, Volume 1, Edited by Rajkumar Buyya, Prentice Hall, NJ, USA, 1999.

  Clustering is becoming increasingly popular, as cluster systems can deliver better performance than traditional mainframes and supercomputers at a much lower hardware cost. They can also offer high performance, scalability and high availability to organizations. This comprehensive guide book covers every key issue associated with high-performance cluster computing such as networking, light-weight protocols, resource management systems, representative cluster computing systems. Topics covered include cluster middleware, single system image, active messages, process migration and load balancing, metacomputing, Beowulf cluster, and much more.

  High Performance Cluster Computing: Programming and Applications, Volume 2, Edited by Rajkumar Buyya, Prentice Hall, NJ, USA, 1999.

  This is the only comprehensive source for up-to-the-minute research on programming and applications for state-of-the-art highly-parallel "commodity supercomputers." The book is organized into three areas: programming, environments and development tools; Java as a language of choice for development in highly parallel systems; and state-of-the-art high performance algorithms and applications. All three areas have seen major advances in recent years-and in all three areas, this book offers unprecedented breadth and depth. Now, in this second volume, Rajkumar Buyya brings together contributions from some 30 leaders, addressing the field's most critical programming and applications challenges.

  More information and additional resources at http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/cluster/index.html

• SCI: Scalable Coherent Interface: Architecture and Software for High-Performance Compute Clusters edited by Hermann Hellwagner and Alexander Reinefeld, Springer State-of-the-Art Surveys LNCS 1734, 1999. ISBN 3-540-66696-6.
  http://www.springer.de/cgi-bin/search_book.pl?isbn=3-540-66696-6

Product Announcements

• Sun HPC ClusterTools source code available through Sun Community Source Licensing (SCSL)
  URL:http://www.sun.com/hpc/communitysource

New Web Sites on Cluster Computing

• URLs of Past Beowulf/Cluster conferences:
  Ameslab's Pentium Pro Cluster Conference, April 1997:
  http://www.scl.ameslab.gov/workshops/PPCworkshop.html

  Sandia's Scalable Clusters Workshop, Nov., 1997: http://rocs-pc.ca.sandia.gov/scw/scw.html
  Note: some broken links! Individual files can be accessed at http://rocs-pc.ca.sandia.gov/scw/

• Cluster Computing Web Page at Chemnitz University of Technology,Chemnitz, Germany
  http://www.tu-chemnitz.de/informatik/RA/cchp/index.html
  Created and maintained by W. Rehm and A. Munke.

• Second German Workshop Cluster Computing, Universität Karlsruhe, March 1999:
  http://www.tu-chemnitz.de/informatik/RA/CC99/index.html
  Some papers in German, some in English.

• Web Proceedings of Cluster Computing Workshop Session held at PDPTA'99, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, July 1999:
  http://www.dgs.monash.edu.au/~rajkumar/pdpta99/cctea_adv.html

• The Beowulf Underground Web site http://www.beowulf-underground.org/

• JPC4-5 "Beowulf and Beyond" on-line presentations from The Fifth Joint DOE/NASA PC Clustered Computing Conference. October 6 - 8, 1999, American Museum of Science and Energy, Oak Ridge, Tennessee
  http://www.csm.ornl.gov/JPC4/JPCagenda.html

• A Review of Commercial and Research Cluster Computing Management Software Packages by National HPCC Software Exchange (NHSE), 1996
  http://www.nhse.org/NHSEreview/CMS/index.html

• Java Special Interest Group (Java SIG) of the EuroTools Working Group for European High Performance Computing and Networking Tools Promotion.
  http://www.cscs.ch/Official/SoftwareTech/Java-SIG/

Short Articles

• System I/O Effort Renamed InfiniBand^TM Trade Association

  By Dan Hyde
  Department of Computer Science
  Bucknell University
  November 30, 1999

  A new switched-fabric input/output (I/O) connectivity standards group formerly known as System I/O has been recently renamed the InfiniBand^TM Trade Association. The new organization is led by seven steering companies: Compaq, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, and Sun Microsystems. Sponsoring companies include 3Com, Adaptec, Cisco, Fujitsu-Siemens, Hitachi, Lucent, NEC and Nortel Networks. Since another thirteen companies are also members, the Association has wide representation within the industry. The Association states it is dedicated to developing a new common I/O specification to deliver a channel based, switched fabric technology that the entire industry can adopt.

  The players in the industry are moving quickly to replace the existing shared bus I/O bottleneck. Back in August, 1999, seven of the computer industry's leading companies, Compaq, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, and Sun Microsystems merged the best ideas of the Future I/O (FIO) and Next Generation I/O (NGIO) input/output architectures into one called System I/O. Two months later in October, 1999, these same seven companies formed the steering members of the new InfiniBand^TM Trade Association. The Association claims to be on schedule to deliver a comprehensive draft specification to members by the end of 1999. A final release specification is targeted for early 2000 and initial products based on the specification are expected to be in production in 2001.

  The new initiative is to provide one, powerful and scalable I/O architecture for the computer industry. The Association is developing an industry specification for a channel-based, switched fabric architecture that provides a scalable performance range of 500MB/s to 6GB/s per link, meeting the needs from entry level to high-end enterprise systems.

  Of interest to TFCC members is that the initiative will provide an industry-standard for a system area network (SAN) fabric for efficient support of both conventional server I/O and inter-processor communication within parallel clusters.

  Details of the specification aren't yet available because it's still being drafted. However, one can gleam some ideas from the presentations of the TFCC Sponsored Birds of a Feather (BOF) Session on High Speed Interconnects for COTS Cluster Computing at Super Computing '99, Portland, Oregon, USA on November 16, 1999. The presentations are on-line at http://www.atoll-net.de/news-bofsc99.html

  It is clear to many in the industry that there will be dramatic increases in I/O requirements in the near future. And current bus-based I/O architectures such as PCI or its extension PCI-X won't hack it. The new specification seems to be aiming at a channel-based I/O architecture connecting two address spaces. Protected direct memory access (DMA) engines are driven by a work queue at each end. The channel communication uses packet switching and is controlled by a Host Channel Adaptor (HCA) and a Target Channel Adaptor (TCA) driven by a second work queue.

  Hints from TFCC member Greg Pfister of IBM, who is actively involved in the specification, indicate that InfiniBand^TM's target includes the "mass market" (high volume and cheap) and it's possible that the necessary components will eventually be on processor chips.

  More information on InfiniBand^TM is available at http://www.sysio.org/.

  ---

• Sandia's CPLant Cluster Ranked 44th in Top 500 List

  By Dan Hyde
  Department of Computer Science
  Bucknell University
  November 30, 1999

  On November 11, 1999 for SuperComputing '99, Jack Dongarra of University of Tennessee, and Hans-Werner Meuer of Mannheim University published the 14th version of the TOP 500 Supercomputing Sites (http://www.top500.org/). Interestingly, the machine ranked 44th is described as "Self-made"! Two other "Self-made" or build-your-own computing clusters are listed as well. Computing clusters have moved into the big ring!

  The 44th entry is held by the CPlant cluster of Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque , New Mexico, USA (http://www.cs.sandia.gov/cplant/). The compute partition of the Computational Plant (CPLANT) is composed of 592 Compaq XP1000 workstations, each of which contains:

  • 500 MHz Alpha 21264 microprocessor
  • 256 MB ECC SDRAM
  • 4 MB L3 cache
  • 10/100BaseTx-integrated ethernet

  The 592 compute node workstations are connected with Myricom's Myrinet gigabit networking hardware. Each node contains a 64-bit, 33 MHz Myrinet LANai-7 network interface card connected to a 16-port SAN/LAN switch.

  The ranking of the TOP 500 is determined by the best Linpack benchmark performance. A 580 node CPlant performed at a R_MAX of 232.6 GFLOPS compared to the number one ranking of the Intel-constructed ASCI Red also at Sandia National Labs, Albuquerque (R_MAX of 2379.6 GFLOPS).

  The other two "Self-made" Top 500 machines are the Avalon Cluster of Los Alamos National Laboratory (ranked 265th at R_MAX of 48.6 GFLOPS) (http://cnls.lanl.gov/avalon/) and the Parnass2 Cluster at University Bonn (ranked 454th at R_MAX of 34.23 GFLOPS) (http://wwwwissrech.iam.uni-bonn.de/research/projects/parnass).