Texas Advanced Computing Center

When completed, Stampede will comprise several thousand Dell “Zeus” servers with each server having dual 8-core processors from the forthcoming Intel® Xeon® Processor E5 Family (formerly codenamed “Sandy Bridge-EP”) and each server with 32 gigabytes of memory. This production system will offer almost 2 petaflops of peak performance, which is double the current top system in XD, and the real performance of scientific applications will see an even greater performance boost due to the newer processor and interconnect technologies. The cluster will also include a new innovative capability: Intel® Many Integrated Core (MIC) co-processors codenamed “Knights Corner,” providing an additional 8 petaflops of performance. Intel MIC co-processors are designed to process highly parallel workloads and provide the benefits of using the most popular x86 instruction set. This will greatly simplify the task of porting and optimizing applications on Stampede to utilize the performance of both the Intel Xeon processors and Intel MIC co-processors.

via Texas Advanced Computing Center.

DOORS

rcm2 limited has considerable experience and expertise in Systems Engineering/System Integration processes, Requirements Management processes and IT tools, in particular the DOORS database from Telelogic. We have a number of DOORS licenses that are shared among our DOORS User Group for various client projects and internal consultancy as well as bespoke solutions.

via DOORS (Dynamic Object-Oriented Requirements System).

Open Virtualization Alliance signs 200+ members

The rapid growth in OVA membership is a sign of KVM’s potential in emerging markets and the cloud, where open virtualization is poised to be a key technology that can help reduce costs, increase virtual machine density, and improve performance and scalability. In fact, according to a recent member survey, more than 50 percent of OVA members are focused on cloud computing.

via Open Virtualization Alliance signs 200+ members – TechSpot News.

How to build your own Linux distro

Few new distros are created from scratch, although it is possible – see the Linux From Scratch HOWTOs at www.linuxfromscratch.org if you want to try it. Apart from getting a head start, there are other reasons to hang on the coat-tails of another distro, and probably the biggest is package compatibility. Consider that there are over 18,000 free software packages considered good enough to be in Debian, and many more that aren’t on that project’s radar.

How to build your own Linux distro | TuxRadar Linux.

Inside the Linux boot process

Summary: The process of booting a Linux® system consists of a number of stages. But whether you’re booting a standard x86 desktop or a deeply embedded PowerPC® target, much of the flow is surprisingly similar. This article explores the Linux boot process from the initial bootstrap to the start of the first user-space application. Along the way, you’ll learn about various other boot-related topics such as the boot loaders, kernel decompression, the initial RAM disk, and other elements of Linux boot.

via Inside the Linux boot process.

$1,279-per-hour, 30,000-core cluster built on Amazon EC2 cloud

The cluster, announced publicly this week, was created for an unnamed “Top 5 Pharma” customer, and ran for about seven hours at the end of July at a peak cost of $1,279 per hour, including the fees to Amazon and Cycle Computing. The details are impressive: 3,809 compute instances, each with eight cores and 7GB of RAM, for a total of 30,472 cores, 26.7TB of RAM and 2PB (petabytes) of disk space. Security was ensured with HTTPS, SSH and 256-bit AES encryption, and the cluster ran across data centers in three Amazon regions in the United States and Europe. The cluster was dubbed “Nekomata.”

via $1,279-per-hour, 30,000-core cluster built on Amazon EC2 cloud.

Welcome to MariaDB! – MariaDB

MariaDB is a database server that offers drop-in replacement functionality for MySQL. MariaDB is built by some of the original authors of MySQL, with assistance from the broader community of Free and open source software developers. In addition to the core functionality of MySQL, MariaDB offers a rich set of feature enhancements including alternate storage engines, server optimizations, and patches.

via Welcome to MariaDB! – MariaDB.

Business Owner’s Toolkit: Starting Sole Proprietorships

Starting Sole Proprietorships

The easiest and least expensive way to begin operating a business is as a sole proprietorship. You simply decide to begin operating the business as a sole proprietor and you’re done.

There are no documents or forms needed, unless the business will operate under a name other than the owner’s name

via Business Owner’s Toolkit: Starting Sole Proprietorships.