There was a lot to be impressed with at SUNW's conference yesterday. Could one say SUNW had redefined the very structure of computing -- moving it away from the boxes, to the network architecture -- and thus putting it in a league by itself. I was most impressed by the redefinition of computing architecture as revealed in this announcement. I think it is very significant and will drive the direction of the computing industry for the next 5 years and further:
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biz.yahoo.com
Wednesday September 27, 9:55 am Eastern Time
Press Release
SOURCE: Sun Microsystems, Inc.
Sun Microsystems Redefines Technical Computing With Software to Extend Power Of the Net to the Desktop
Sun Grid Engine Software is Designed to Dynamically Scale Technical Compute Environments and Fundamentally Change the
Economics of Resource Investments
NEW YORK, Sept. 27 /PRNewswire/ -- Sun Microsystems, Inc. is once again redefining technical computing by offering Sun(TM) Grid Engine software free via Sun's web site, sun.com, and with every Sun system, helping its customers to create a Sun(TM) Virtual Compute Farm, extending the compute resources of the network to the desktop.
Sun Grid Engine software is designed to harness idle compute resources, match them to individual job requirements and deliver network-wide compute power to the desktop, thus speeding time to market and fundamentally changing the economics of technical computing. An optimized technical compute farm using Sun Grid Engine software can push the utilization of an organization's computing resources from a typical 20 percent to as high as 90 percent.
``The Sun Grid Engine distributed resource management software promises dramatic payoffs for technical computing,'' said Mark Canepa, vice president and general manager, Internet Desktop & Server Group, Sun Microsystems. ``Our goal in offering Sun Grid Engine software free of charge is to help companies maximize their workstation and server assets, and allow them to develop a Sun Virtual Compute Farm to meet even the toughest technical computing challenges.''
Sun Grid Engine software is designed to deliver the products and technologies to provide the massive scalability, real-time response, continuous service availability and agility needed to help companies keep pace with and capitalize on the Net Effect -- the macro-economic trend that is driving the exponential growth and increasing complexity the industry is experiencing as data, users, devices, services and uptime/availability requirements continue to multiply.
The use of Sun Grid Engine software addresses the tremendous need for massive compute power in technical computing applications, such as electronic design automation (EDA), mechanical computer-aided design/engineering (MCAD/MCAE) and software development. By bringing full network resources to bear on the applications, businesses can meet ever-shorter deadlines for product development and positively respond at the speed of the Internet economy.
Commitment to Make Distributed Resource Management Software Ubiquitous
Sun's recent acquisition of Gridware, a privately-owned commercial vendor of advanced distributed resource management software, is projected to enable Sun to make this type of technology ubiquitous by eliminating cost, driving standards, ensuring heterogenous cross-platform support and, through a robust open source implementation, create dynamic community participation.
By distributing Sun Grid Engine software free, Sun is changing the economics of technical computing and breaking down the barriers of employing this advanced technology by eliminating all entry-level implementation costs, improving return on total technical computing investments, improving ease of deployment and use and -- with Sun's backing and support -- removing the risks associated with independently built systems.
Sun plans to ensure that Sun Grid Engine software will continue to be available for today's heterogeneous computing environments which require strong cross- platform support. Sun will work with independent software vendors to embed the technology in their applications, collaborate with partners who will support the installation and optimization of the technology in customer environments, and establish an industry-wide accepted open source license.
Sun Grid Engine software is designed to enable job-level load balancing across the network; a master scheduler algorithm matches tasks with available resources and queues multiple requests based on needs and priority as well as providing system administrators access to users and job status reports. Sun plans to support this technology with a free comprehensive web-based program including an online technology forum with e-mail Q&A capabilities and
training.
Fee-based support and training will also be available.
An Integral Part of Sun's Systems
Sun Grid Engine software will be pre-loaded onto all Sun(TM) workstations, including the Sun Blade(TM) 1000 workstation announced today (Editor's note: See today's related press release at sun.com and will be available for all Sun systems. It will also be pre-loaded onto the Sun(TM) Technical Compute Farm system, which is designed to provide customers in the technical computing market with a turnkey compute farm solution, delivering the advantages of massive scalability, continuous real-time computing and integrated software/hardware stacks, which are all key components to capitalize on the Net Effect.
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All the best,
Michael |
