The second version of Thinking Machines Corp’s GlobalWorks software for linking Sun Microsystems Inc UltraSparc and HyperSparc servers and workstations for parallel application processing is out of beta testing next month, and the third release due early next year will link heterogeneous Sun environments with Silicon Graphics Inc machines running Irix. And this time next year the company hopes to have added IBM Corp SP2 support and a fully-parallel file system, although the SP2 work hasn’t started yet. Globalworks 1.0, out now, has basic Message Passing Interface technology and a new Parallel Virtual Machine. The second release, originally slated for June, features beefed-up message passing and data parallel programming tools (CI No 2,89 4). There is another new Parallel Virtual Machine, a new Subset High-Performance Fortran compiler, and a new version of C*, the Thinking Machines data parallel version of C. Also new this time is Data Fabric, a way of message-passing programmers to code in a data parallel style. Josh Symons, chief technical lead for GlobalWorks described the message-passing programming as almost assembly language level in that the coder must take care of moving the data around. But with Data Fabric, he claims, parallel objects can be created that span the entire cluster, with the data flow controlled automatically. Other new features of Release 2 include load balancing to recognize the difference between a Hyper- and UltraSparcs and symmetric multiproc essing cluster support, as well as an increased Message Passing Interface input-output subset. Release 3 will move all this to the Silicon Graphics system and add some low-level software to decrease latency between nodes in the GlobalWorks server – racks of UltraSparcs. Symons reckoned the latency time will be less than 100 microseconds. Release 3 will go into beta test at around the end of the first quarter of next year, with general availability about six weeks later. With the fourth release supporting SP2, set for a year from now, Thinking Machines is going after commercial markets rather than just its strengths in government and petroleum arenas as at present. Meantime, Thinking Machines announced that its Darwin data mining tool wil l be available in the fourth quarter on IBM RS/6000 SP running its AIX Unix and Digital Equipment Corp’s AlphaServers under both Unix and Windows NT.
