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IBM Software Linux

IBM's Blue Gene powered by Linux 290

Posted by CowboyNeal from the big-iron-on-tux'-hip dept.
bigjnsa500 writes "Linux will be the main operating system for IBM's upcoming family of 'Blue Gene' supercomputers--a major endorsement for the operating system and the open-source computing model it represents. Blue Gene/L, the first member of the family, will contain 65,000 processors and 16 trillion bytes of memory. Due in 2004 or 2005, the system will be able to perform 200 trillion calculations per second. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory will use the system for performing nuclear weapons simulations." Blue Gene has been announced for some time, but it's cool to see how it's shaping up.
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IBM's Blue Gene powered by Linux More

IBM's Blue Gene powered by Linux

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  • SCO Linux (Score:5, Funny)

    by petecarlson ( 457202 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:38AM (#7355541) Homepage Journal
    Hmm, I wonder why they chose to use SCO's OS. You would think with all the lawsuits they would try to stay away from SCO's software...
    • They have been told to drop AIX by wait for it...... SCO.
    • IBM expects the Unix offshoot to be more popular than its own version of Unix, called AIX

      The truth is that AIX isn't entirely IBM's property, and Linux is not Unix. I guess SCO has an operative inside of zdnet.

      Funny how Apple makes supercomputers with IBM's chips while IBM makes supercomputers with AMD's chips. Sun is starting to us x86 and Sparc64 chips despite its own UltraSparc line. HP dropped the Saturn chip for ARM. Can anyone afford their own chips these days?

  • ASCI Red Storm runs SuSE Linux (Score:4, Informative)

    by Boone^ ( 151057 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:39AM (#7355549)
    ...and it's got 10,368 2 GHz Opterons. (link [rice.edu])

    ASCI Red Storm google search [google.com]

    • from the page:

      **The nodes themselves will run custom Sandia-developed light-weight OS code-named Catamount. The service and storage nodes will run SuSE Linux.**

      so.. it doesn't really 'run suse linux' as a whole, even though it's in the mix.

  • in other news (Score:5, Funny)

    by t0ny ( 590331 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:40AM (#7355561)
    In other news, Levi's has announced a lawsuit against IBM, citing the name of the server line could confuse their customers.

  • Zowie (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Blue Gene/L is expected to operate at about 200 teraflops which is larger than the total computing power of the top 500 supercomputers in the world today.

  • It should be noted (Score:2, Informative)

    by wmaker ( 701707 )
    It should be noted that these super computers won't be for sale... IBM simply leases the cycles, you pay based on the cycles you use every month.

  • How many apples is that? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by goombah99 ( 560566 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:43AM (#7355576)
    Wow 650,000 processors. what's that in equivalent g5 flops, say 4000 or so :-P

    kidding aside, are these based on the novel IBM design for having small clusters of wimpy processors sharing sections of memory. The concept being to have each processor running slowly, almost stalled waiting on a memory fetch. (while seeming stupid at first glance, its really diabolically clever since now you can junk all the long pipelines and branch prediction stuff: every single byte that comes from memory will be used by some CPU requesting it, thus you minimize the memmory buss buttle neck that is, ultimately, the limit on most processing).

    if this is that design then that 65,000 processors indeed may not be quite as much computing horespower as it sounds. it might indeed be comparable to a smaller handful of G5s.

    or maybe i'm full of crap.

    • Re:How many apples is that? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ocelotbob ( 173602 ) <ocelot.ocelotbob@org> on Friday October 31, 2003 @01:12AM (#7355740) Homepage
      Uh, IBM makes the G5, or rather, the PPC970. I think they of all people would know whether or not the processor is suitable for the task at hand. Don't you agree?
      • Uh, IBM makes the G5, or rather, the PPC970. I think they of all people would know whether or not the processor is suitable for the task at hand. Don't you agree?

        By building the machine out of the CPUs they used, IBM demonstrates that as a company they prefer not to use the G5 at this moment. But they might turn around and use the G5 later.

        Remember the IBM PS/2 line? The rest of the PC industry stuck with ISA architecture for a long time, nearly killing IBM.

        No one knows everything.
    • or maybe i'm full of crap.

      The first step on the path to enlightenment is accurate self-reflection.

  • Nuclear Weapons (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jonhuang ( 598538 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:45AM (#7355588) Homepage
    Somewhere, there's an open source developer who's just realized that his work is being used to the development of nuclear weapons. All jokes about derivative works aside, I think it's a good time to consider the implications of this.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
      Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • And Nobel discovered that dynamite could be used to kill people as easily as it could be used in mining or construction. What's new?

        Actually, this is a fine example ... because, though Nobel did not initially conceive of dynamite as a product for military use, it quickly became used for such ... and, in fact, Nobel himself became closely involved with the military munitions industry and the questions and problems surrounding it.

        Particularly germane to the subject of nuclear weapons, Nobel felt that the

    • Re:Nuclear Weapons (Score:5, Insightful)

      by cgranade ( 702534 ) <cgranade&gmail,com> on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:48AM (#7355606) Homepage Journal
      As opposed to if he charged for it, in which he would have just made blood money, and implicitly accepted the use of the technology. In this case, he/she can't say that s/he endorses the use, because they released the technology from their hands. To be sure, it is still disturbing, but not in the same way...

    • Re:Nuclear Weapons (Score:3, Insightful)

      by davejenkins ( 99111 )
      Somewhere, there's an open source developer who's just realized that his work is being used to the development of nuclear weapons. All jokes about derivative works aside, I think it's a good time to consider the implications of this.

      Somewhere else, there's an open source developer who's just realized that his work is being used to power machines for Doctors without Borders, the Red Cross, a number of innercity churches and rec centers, and hospitals.

      Yet somewhere else, there are soldiers testing out new
      • Additionally, simulating nuclear weapons on a giant computer means that there'll be one fewer glassy patch in New Mexico or cratered atoll in the Pacific.
    • Somewhere, there's an open source developer who's just realized that his work is being used to the development of nuclear weapons. All jokes about derivative works aside, I think it's a good time to consider the implications of this.

      Well that is one of many reasons why some people prefer a more restrictive license for their work. When you restrict your product and exchange it for Money, then the money is the universal medium of exchange, not the software. In the Open Source world, money buys beer, pizza
    • Actually, no, it isn't being used for the development of nuclear weapons. It's being used in place of actual detonation of nuclear weapons. Without these computers, the choice the U.S. Government would make is not decomissioning its arsenal of nuclear weapons; the choice it would make is to resume underground nuclear testing.
    • I think our knowledge of nuclear weapons technology is already sufficient to kill us all. At this point, no amount of incremental improvement is really going to make that big of a difference.

      Wake me up when Linux is turned to the task of creating the next superplague.
    • True, free knowledge can be used for evil or for good. For instance, a developer could place his open source work under a licence that specifically forbids specific uses (and this is something I did when I was younger, more idealistic, and less realistic). My early OSS works were not GPLd, but used a BSD-style license with certain conditions.
      The problem with this is that you cannot simultaneously restrict and promote knowledge. As another poster has commented, everything we do as a society is interlinked
    • Somewhere, there's a baker who's just realized that his bread is being eaten by burglars, murderers, con-artists, scientists working on wmd-s and lawyers.
    • ... someone realizes that he is breathing an atmosphere shared with actual nuclear weapons, infused with toxic dust from airliners crashing into buildings. There is water vapor which ran thru baby diapers. And others walk over the very land where massive numbers of people died in countless wars, he is following in their very footsteps!

      Oh, the horror, the horror!
    • It may be that Linux is currently being used to develop nuclear weapons, but this article has nothing to do with that. As the name implies, Blue Gene will be used for genetics research. Specifically, the protien folding problem, which in turn could help Geneticists to develop new wonder drugs without the current random trial and error methods they use. Imagine if we could simply plug in the code for HIV, run it through the computer, and custom design a drug to fight it. I'd think the developers of Linux
    • Actually, Blue Gene is being built to simulate protein folding if I remember correctly. Sure, it could be used for other purposes, but so could any computer. The project you may be thinking of is called ASCI White [llnl.gov] . Here's the ASCI [llnl.gov] project (Accelerated Strategic Computing Initiative).

  • Nuke simulations? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by gumpish ( 682245 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:45AM (#7355591) Journal
    Why are computers still being used for simulating nuclear weapons tests?

    Are they trying to pack more megatons of destructive force into each warhead? Don't the major world governments have enough quantity to preclude the need for more powerful units?

    Or are the tests run to design "safer" and/or more localized implementations? (Awww, looks like Big Brother has a soft spot after all...)

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
      Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re:Nuke simulations? (Score:2, Insightful)

      by cranos ( 592602 )
      I'ld much rather they were running comp simulations than real tests. "Look mah, no hands, teeth, hair, nails...."

    • Re:Nuke simulations? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by RevRigel ( 90335 )
      The primary use for these simulations is to verify that, based on the current state of maintenance/decay of our current stockpile of nuclear weapons, how well those weapons are going to work. Aside from the obvious issues with the active ingredients decaying over time, there are other issues with materials that must be simulated. It's not necessarily used for new weapons development, although that is one use.

    • Re:Nuke simulations? (Score:5, Informative)

      by goombah99 ( 560566 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @01:06AM (#7355704)
      Why are computers still being used for simulating nuclear weapons tests?

      Historically, the modern reason for computer simulation of nukes is to put a stopper in the nuclear proliferation genie. The logic is convoluted but sensible. The idea is that first you get a test ban treaty. Second, You offer economic and power production aid to all countries that dont develop nuke engineering or let you control their plutonium bearing nuke waste.

      this creates a situation where nuke weapon engineering has to be done either in secret (since there no civial reactor technology to produce plutonium) or if done overtly, they still cant test their weapons. Neither can we.

      this leaves everyone in a delightful position of 1) not being perfectly certain their nukes will work when delivered. thus they are not good offensive weapons. (imagine what would happen if pakistan launched on india and it were a dud).
      2) yet they still make good defensive weapons since even though its not tested it doesn;t mean it wont work.

      which is sort of nice. it discourages both developement and first use. world is MAD but better off.

      Unfortunately the US would never go for this if they did not have a way of testing their own weapons. So they do it in silico rather than in nevada. This allows us the political will to go through with this. a better world results. THe clock is ticking. we know the weapons will work now but they are aging.. will they work in say ten years. THis is where computer simulations come in. within ten years we should be able to model nukes and nuke aging on one of these machines at a level that gaurentees our readiness. or maybe if this test ban thing works we can just scrap them all in ten years.

      that was the plan. But now with about 30 countries with potential nuke development capability this plan maybe about to break down. thus we go to plan B.

      plan B is we use these big computers to design new reactors that dont produce plutonium. We sell these to the countries. now they can have nuke power without creating weapons grade plutonium. Again every body happy.

      except of course N. Korea.

    • Re:Nuke simulations? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Malc ( 1751 )
      That goes on the pile with those other questions like why do the US and Russia still have thousands of missiles pointed at each other a decade after the cold war thawed? Why is the nuclear briefcase still following the President around and why are missile pointed at Russia still ready to launch with 2 minutes notice? Wasn't there an issue a couple of years back where the Russian President activated his nuclear briefcase on what turned out to be a false alarm?

      I guess if you're going to maintain a nuclear
    • Are they trying to pack more megatons of destructive force into each warhead?

      Nope, they're trying to create a massive War-Sim in which nation-heads could raise war for a real deal.

      "I'll nuke your a$$ unless you inflat your yuan."
      "I don't fear your but I don't want to mess up the houses and railroads I spent three months on. You can get 6 yuan for 1 and you must neutralize a warhead in reallife as part of the deal."
      "too late butthead, it has been launched already.Frankly, I just want to see how it e
    • Not everything goes towards improving the destructive force of the warhead.

      Simulating the explosive force and shape of an aging stockpile, as well as the manner in which the warheads are stored requires some serious computing.
    • Why are computers still being used for simulating nuclear weapons tests?

      Just wait until Quake XXXIV is released: global thermonuclear destruction!
    • Are they trying to pack more megatons of destructive force into each warhead?

      No, they are making sure 50 year old bombs still work.

      -Eyston
  • Heh, while I realize that innovation has always been important for IBM and making money, it seems like they're trying too much to innovate and not enough to capture market share. It's like they're coming out with all these great inventions but they're pursuing pure science and not having a profit-making strategy.

    Of course I realize that I'm probably wrong in some way but this is just how it seems to me.

  • Wait a sec.. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Epistax ( 544591 ) <epistax AT gmail DOT com> on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:49AM (#7355611) Journal
    The IBM research team is currently running a large Linux cluster to simulate Blue Gene.

    So then why don't have we have the simulation of Blue Gene run a simulation of Blue Gene two, and that run a simulation of a quantum computer, and that run a simulation of Deep Thought? Then that can run a simulation of the rest of the universe.
    Then the two will bicker and argue about who's real, whom created whom, and millions of Matrix freaks will yell "I told you!!!" to those who have ridiculed them so many, many years.

  • Is this news? (Score:4, Informative)

    by phch ( 398574 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:52AM (#7355628)
    The referenced article is dated October 2002. Is this a mistake, or is this old news?

    Anyhow, going to the Blue Gene [ibm.com] web page, there is a document dated Nov 2002, an overview of BlueGene/L. An excerpt:

    The approach we have adopted is to split the operating system functionality between compute and I/O nodes...

    The compute node operating system, also called the BlueGene/L compute node kernel, is a simple, lightweight, single-user operating system that supports execution of a single dual-threaded application compute process...

    I/O nodes are expected to run the Linux operating system, supporting the execution of multiple processes. Only system software executes on the I/O nodes, no application code.

  • Beating plowshares into swords (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Ralph Wiggam ( 22354 ) * on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:55AM (#7355646) Homepage
    When did Blue Gene change to a nuclear simulation computer? Last I heard it was for protien folding and DNA research, which is why it's called Blue GENE. This way it's like the Utah Jazz.

    -B
  • If we named it Blue Gene Roddenberry, would it write, direct, and produce a show for us better than Enterprise or Voyager?

  • What video card to use with this bad boy? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 31, 2003 @12:57AM (#7355659)
    Do you go with ATI or Nvidia?

    Good frame rate for Quake 3??

    AA on or off?

    VSynch on or off?

  • all well and good... (Score:4, Funny)

    by pizza_milkshake ( 580452 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @01:01AM (#7355676)
    but what kind of video card does it have? will have 65,536 monitor support?
    • but what kind of video card does it have? will have 65,536 monitor support?

      You mean 65,535 monitors. 65,536 would require 17 bits to render...

      (remember, 0 is a number to us programmer types!)
    • Word on the street has it that this baby will support 65,536 unique colors all on the same screen.

  • SCO's Bill.... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Hanzie ( 16075 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @01:10AM (#7355729)
    65,000 processors x $699/processor= $45,435,000. 45.4 million dollars.

    Don't you just know Daryl's about to go apoplectic over all that money IBM is "stealing". Let's face it, he has to really believe in his private universe.

    May he pop a blood vessel.

    • Don't you just know Daryl's about to go apoplectic over all that money IBM is "stealing".

      I think you have just discovered IBM's new strategy ... make opponent go insane by showing off major muscles ;)
    • 65,000 processors x $699/processor= $45,435,000. 45.4 million dollars.

      Don't you just know Daryl's about to go apoplectic over all that money IBM is "stealing".

      SCO is currently suing IBM for $5,000,000,000 dollars. Your number above represents 0.9% of that figure.

      Even in the SCO world, I doubt they're losing any sleep over this...

  • Perform some nuclear "tests" beforehand to ensure their next legal strategy against SCO will be effective. . . .
  • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory will use the system for performing nuclear weapons simulations.

    See, Microsoft's allies were right all the long.... Linux/Open Source is the choice for Terrorists!
  • There they go using that unconstitutionally licensed OS again... with our tax dollars too. .. that will be able to perform a quadrillion calculations per second (one petaflop)...

    That oughta give 'em the firepower to prototype the nuclear WMD that can surgically remove the state of Utah without bothering the neighbors.

  • about that nuke research- (Score:4, Informative)

    by rritterson ( 588983 ) * on Friday October 31, 2003 @01:24AM (#7355790)
    afaik, the research isn't on weapons development, but explosions research and weapons defense.(The more you know about the explosion the easier it is to design nuclear resistant bunkers and the like)

    For those of you wondering why it takes 1 pflop to do such a simulation consider how much computing power it would take to follow each gas molecule in the explosion as it expands. They won't be able to get even remotely close to that precise, obviously. (6x10^23 molecules in 22 liters at room temp, so figure about 10^25 molecules to follow around)

    Also, keep in mind that 70% of academic research dollars are defense related. (whether you like that or not, sadly)

  • What *I* Can't Wait For... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by philovivero ( 321158 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @01:28AM (#7355803) Homepage Journal
    When we get a supercomputer like this and the end of the article isn't "Some company will use this to find newer more efficient ways of killing people" but instead "Some university will use this to find ways of improving society at large."

    I'm dreaming. I know.

    • Re:What *I* Can't Wait For... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Copid ( 137416 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @01:51AM (#7355897)
      Most of the supercomputers that people whine about because they support weapons development support a lot of other research as well. In fact, a lot less research would get done if we didn't have defense departments pissing away money on anything that might possibly have weapons potential.

      Lots of wrothwhile stuff gets done on those machines, believe it or not. Just like lots of worthwhile stuff gets done at Lawrence Livermore Lab. They're famous for their weapons, but the amount of other research done there is staggering.

    • Umm this ISNT for killing people, it's for testing nuclear weapons. Yes they may simulate explosions of weapons, but they also test and simulate the effects of having these nukes sit here for so long, see if they're stable or not.
    • First they say: We create blue GENE. It will be the fastest computer on the earth, and we need it to understand our dna, cure cancer, ect.

      And now its about to be build, they use it for nuclear weapon research :(
      • Since the alternative to using the computer is the U.S. government actually detonating nuclear weapons in underground tests, I'd say it's a pretty good use of the computer, myself.
    • Creating nuclear weapons is not NP complete. Improving society is.
  • It wouldn't be named after Gene Amdahl [hyperdictionary.com] now, would it?
  • Imagine a beowulf cluster of .....
    (hold on).
    Oh, never mind.

  • Cool name... (Score:3, Funny)

    by glenebob ( 414078 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @01:56AM (#7355925)
    They were going to name it "Billy Gene" but the name "Blue Gene" just "Beat It".

    Yeah, 9th grade was like some sort of nightmare for me which seems to just live on and on...

  • Bug report (Score:5, Funny)

    by S.I.O. ( 180787 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @02:41AM (#7356035)
    Dear Linus,

    the kernel is becoming slightly unstable with more than 10 trillion bytes and 65000 CPUs, please try to reproduce the situation. See the attached memory dump file.

  • More corporate welfare... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 31, 2003 @03:01AM (#7356088)
    Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory will use the system for performing nuclear weapons simulations.

    I commented on a similar previous corporate welfare handout where IBM was producing some software to mimic the human brain or some crap like that...to the tune of around half a billion dollars.

    This is yet another such example...Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is "operated by the University of California for the U.S. Department of Energy" This is yet another example of the public subsidizing hech tech industries, specifically IBM but it happens for others as well.

    When are enough people going to stand up and put a stop to this bullshit so that we can use our money for much better use? Or better yet, when is the public going to be involved in deciding for themselves which projects get priority and how they are to be run?

    And our government has the nerve to lecture others on how to run a democracy!
  • A computer that can run Doom 3!

  • How long to crack 128 bit encryption? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by mcrbids ( 148650 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @03:59AM (#7356229) Journal
    Ok, assume I have a 128 bit key. How long to crack with a supercomputer this size? Anybody have a reference to mips->cracking time for something like this?

    Just a thought...

  • "Blue Gene/L, the first member of the family, will contain 65,000 processors and 16 trillion bytes of memory."

    But does it support SATA RAID5?

  • "16 trillion bytes of data"... Duhhhh. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Bowie J. Poag ( 16898 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @06:24AM (#7356636) Homepage

    I just love it when someone writes an article, and doesn't know hot to put it into words people can understand.. So they come up with this jackass "it's a million billion!" shit.

    16 trillion bytes of data = Approx 15 terabytes.

    What the hell is so hard about saying "15TB" ?

  • WTF? Nuclear weapons research? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by vandan ( 151516 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @06:33AM (#7356661) Homepage
    If they're going to put so much money and so much effort into this, why do they have to research nuclear weapons? Surely we have enough weapons for everyone now. For fuck's sake. There's enough to wipe out all life on the planet hundreds of thousands of times over.

    Why not research into harnessing different kinds of energy. Or search for a cure for cancer. Or look for fucking aliens.

    But please. Not more fucking weapons. There are enough.
  • I can't believe I'm about to say this, but I'm proud of IBM. Back when I was computing on my TI 99/4A, I used to root for Compaq and the other "clones" because IBM was the man. Looks like they are the most forward thinking corporation on the planet. Either that or their just as greedy as they've ever been and free software slaves in open source spell PROFIT! That was sarcasm. Or was it?
  • 16,000,000,000K should be enough for anybody. But don't quote me on that!
  • 65,000 processors at $650 per CPU to license the SCO portion of Linux comes out to $42,250,000.

    I'll take two!

  • Why Linux? (Score:3, Funny)

    by sharkey ( 16670 ) on Friday October 31, 2003 @10:23AM (#7358106)
    Noone wants Blue Screens on their Blue Genes!

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