MAY WORKSHOP "RETOOLS" SUPERCOMPUTER CENTER TRAINERS

The CRPC project entitled "Retooling the Supercomputing Community for Scalable Parallelism" is a National Science Foundation (NSF) Metacenter Regional Alliance (MRA) program designed to provide professional trainers from the supercomputer center sites with up-to-date curricular materials and training in the use of parallel programming tools and methods. Initiated in 1994, the retooling project allows the CRPC to reach a large portion of the High Performance Computing and Communications (HPCC) community by disseminating multimedia educational materials electronically and through annual workshops.

This year's retooling workshop, the 1996 NSF Trainers Institute in Parallel Computing, was held May 6 through 9 at the Cornell Theory Center (CTC). The workshop was an NSF-funded collaboration between the CRPC and the Regional Training Center for Parallel Processing at the North Carolina Supercomputing Center (NCSC), with informal collaboration with the CTC; the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, host of the 1995 workshop; and the San Diego Supercomputer Center, which will host the workshop in 1997.

Approximately 35 scientists and staff members from supercomputer centers around the country attended the event, which featured workshops and hands-on labs in the areas of High Performance Fortran (HPF) with CRPC researcher Chuck Koelbel of Rice University, a short overview of HPCC and Metacomputing with CRPC researchers Mark Baker and Geoffrey Fox of the Northeast Parallel Architectures Center at Syracuse University, and Network-Based Education with Ken Flurchick of Ohio Supercomputer Center, Mladen Vouk of North Carolina State University, Anne Trefethen of CTC, Cherri Pancake of Oregon State University, Geoffrey Fox, and others. Organizer Larry Lee and CRPC Director Ken Kennedy chaired a panel discussion on "Lessons Learned, Issues and Plans." Presenters and panel members included parallel computing experts from universities, corporations, and supercomputer centers.

For more information on the retooling project, see http://www.crpc.rice.edu/CRPC/retool/.

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