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> It does seem to me that it's an accurate assessment to say that this project exists because of the nuclear weapons research mandate. It's not an accurate ass

by gh02t 4y ago

> It does seem to me that it's an accurate assessment to say that this project exists because of the nuclear weapons research mandate. It's not an accurate assessment, in that it's an over-simplification. DoE is a big entity. DoE does weapons research. DoE also does general science research. They are separate responsibilities and have to be, because weapons research is classified and is legally required to be kept separate. The funding pathway that pays for the computing needs of each mission likewise is legally separate and jealously guarded from each other by program managers. The computers are housed, as noted by your quoted press release, in separate laboratories. Those laboratories are run independently of each other, and have distinct responsibilities. Frontier cannot run weapons-related simulations because it's not approved for classified work, which has some really strenuous requirements that the government takes extremely seriously. It is true to say DoE exists because of nuclear weapons research, that's a big part of their role and history. The distinction is that it's not their only role, and their general science mission is not purely in service of the weapons program legally or practically. It's true to say that the programs coexist together and operate in parallel, but they are separate with their own goals. You're citing the goals of the NNSA computing program, which absolutely are weapons-related, but the Office of Science that funds and operates Frontier, Aurora etc is a separate entity with independent funding and governance within DoE. The best analogy I can think of is that it's like saying PowerPoint wouldn't exist without Word. Taken very literally there is an element of truth, but it's a gross oversimplification of the actual situation and history. Note that DoE publicly releases almost all of its unclassified publications on osti.gov for free, including publications using Frontier and the other open supercomputers. OLCF also specifically aggregates publications from researchers using their machines if you wanna get an idea of what is done with them https://www.olcf.ornl.gov/publications/ https://www.olcf.ornl.gov/publications/ . You should be able to get the full texts on OSTI.

areoform 4y ago
I appreciate your points, and objectively you are right. I think the place where we are diverging are in how we slice the history/pie. At this point, at least for me, our discussion is becoming extremely interesting and I'm thinking/learning more in the process. Would you mind humoring me? — For me, this is the fruit of a tree and a part of a long chain of causality. We start with von Neumann fiddling with machines at Los Alamos and wind up at the Accelerated Strategic Computing Initiative from the 90s https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK44974/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK44974/ and then fast forward to the excascale program in the early-to-mid 2010s. I am not a professional, but this is an area of interest for me. And I've been tracking it for some time, and in the earlier communications, the ORNL etc seemed to be fairly clear on who was cutting the checks, from 2013, The Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Science and the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) have awarded $25.4 million in research and development contracts to five leading companies in high-performance computing (HPC) to accelerate the development of next-generation supercomputers. Under DOE’s new DesignForward initiative, AMD, Cray, IBM, Intel Federal and NVIDIA will work to advance extreme-scale, on the path to exascale, computing technology that is vital to national security, scientific research, energy security and the nation's economic competitiveness. “Exascale computing is key to NNSA’s capability of ensuring the safety and security of our nuclear stockpile without returning to underground testing,” said Robert Meisner, director of the NNSA Office of Advanced Simulation and Computing program. “The resulting simulation capabilities will also serve as valuable tools to address nonproliferation and counterterrorism issues, as well as informing other national security decisions.” From: https://www.nersc.gov/news-publications/nersc-news/nersc-center-news/2013/department-of-energy-awards-25-4-million-in-contracts-for-extreme-scale-supercomputer-interconnect-design/ https://www.nersc.gov/news-publications/nersc-news/nersc-cen... The program was funded fully in 2016 after many years of partial funding, ORNL's report, The mission of the Exascale Computing Project (ECP) is the accelerated delivery of a capable exascale computing ecosystem to provide breakthrough solutions addressing our most critical challenges in scientific discovery, energy assurance, economic competitiveness, and national security. As a multi-lab effort, sponsored by the DOE’s Office of Science and National Nuclear Security Administration, the ECP is chartered with the following tasks: Developing exascale-ready applications and solutions that address currently intractable problems of strategic importance and national interest. Creating and deploying an expanded and vertically integrated software stack on DOE HPC pre-exascale and exascale systems. Delivering US HPC vendor technology advances and deploying ECP products to DOE HPC pre-exascale and exascale systems. Delivering exascale simulation and data science innovations and solutions to national problems that enhance US economic competitiveness, change our quality of life, and strengthen our national security. From: https://www.ornl.gov/content/about-ecp https://www.ornl.gov/content/about-ecp I think the other applications are far more important than the weapons research, fwiw. Just as ARPA-net and the internet it spawned ended up being far more valuable than their initial strategic use case. Even if the important stuff is a side project, just like fusion as an eventual source of energy seems to be for NIF, it's great that it's happening at all. Hope this makes sense! Thanks!
- gh02t 4y ago
  NNSA does pay into the broader ECP (which refers to the whole supercomputer program not just Frontier) but they aren't the only contributor. Like I said, DoE does build supercomputers for stockpile maintenance missions. Those computers will be built with basically all NNSA money and probably little to no Office of Science money. AFAIK some amount of NNSA money went into building Frontier specifically but it was earmarked under their non-stockpile missions. NNSA doesn't only design/build/maintain weapons they also are responsible for nuclear security missions. For example, they provide the R&D that backs US support to the IAEA. They are funding a limited amount of unclassified, non-weapons work being done on Frontier in support of their other missions. The key point is that stockpile maintenance is firewalled, both in terms of funding and operations, from the other stuff and they are not the only contributor. DoE has always been a "big tent" of separate missions and I totally understand how it gets confusing. Its predecessor the AEC also had a weird mix of practically orthogonal goals. The non-weapons and non-nuclear missions have gotten a lot bigger in the last 30-40 years and are more or less operated independently of each other. NNSA is also functionally an independent agency within DoE, but it's important to note that they do fund pure science work too, with non-weapons related goals.

by gh02t 4y ago

areoform 4y ago

I appreciate your points, and objectively you are right. I think the place where we are diverging are in how we slice the history/pie. At this point, at least for me, our discussion is becoming extremely interesting and I'm thinking/learning more in the process. Would you mind humoring me? — For me, this is the fruit of a tree and a part of a long chain of causality. We start with von Neumann fiddling with machines at Los Alamos and wind up at the Accelerated Strategic Computing Initiative from the 90s https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK44974/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK44974/ and then fast forward to the excascale program in the early-to-mid 2010s. I am not a professional, but this is an area of interest for me. And I've been tracking it for some time, and in the earlier communications, the ORNL etc seemed to be fairly clear on who was cutting the checks, from 2013, The Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Science and the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) have awarded $25.4 million in research and development contracts to five leading companies in high-performance computing (HPC) to accelerate the development of next-generation supercomputers. Under DOE’s new DesignForward initiative, AMD, Cray, IBM, Intel Federal and NVIDIA will work to advance extreme-scale, on the path to exascale, computing technology that is vital to national security, scientific research, energy security and the nation's economic competitiveness. “Exascale computing is key to NNSA’s capability of ensuring the safety and security of our nuclear stockpile without returning to underground testing,” said Robert Meisner, director of the NNSA Office of Advanced Simulation and Computing program. “The resulting simulation capabilities will also serve as valuable tools to address nonproliferation and counterterrorism issues, as well as informing other national security decisions.” From: https://www.nersc.gov/news-publications/nersc-news/nersc-center-news/2013/department-of-energy-awards-25-4-million-in-contracts-for-extreme-scale-supercomputer-interconnect-design/ https://www.nersc.gov/news-publications/nersc-news/nersc-cen... The program was funded fully in 2016 after many years of partial funding, ORNL's report, The mission of the Exascale Computing Project (ECP) is the accelerated delivery of a capable exascale computing ecosystem to provide breakthrough solutions addressing our most critical challenges in scientific discovery, energy assurance, economic competitiveness, and national security. As a multi-lab effort, sponsored by the DOE’s Office of Science and National Nuclear Security Administration, the ECP is chartered with the following tasks: Developing exascale-ready applications and solutions that address currently intractable problems of strategic importance and national interest. Creating and deploying an expanded and vertically integrated software stack on DOE HPC pre-exascale and exascale systems. Delivering US HPC vendor technology advances and deploying ECP products to DOE HPC pre-exascale and exascale systems. Delivering exascale simulation and data science innovations and solutions to national problems that enhance US economic competitiveness, change our quality of life, and strengthen our national security. From: https://www.ornl.gov/content/about-ecp https://www.ornl.gov/content/about-ecp I think the other applications are far more important than the weapons research, fwiw. Just as ARPA-net and the internet it spawned ended up being far more valuable than their initial strategic use case. Even if the important stuff is a side project, just like fusion as an eventual source of energy seems to be for NIF, it's great that it's happening at all. Hope this makes sense! Thanks!

gh02t 4y ago
NNSA does pay into the broader ECP (which refers to the whole supercomputer program not just Frontier) but they aren't the only contributor. Like I said, DoE does build supercomputers for stockpile maintenance missions. Those computers will be built with basically all NNSA money and probably little to no Office of Science money. AFAIK some amount of NNSA money went into building Frontier specifically but it was earmarked under their non-stockpile missions. NNSA doesn't only design/build/maintain weapons they also are responsible for nuclear security missions. For example, they provide the R&D that backs US support to the IAEA. They are funding a limited amount of unclassified, non-weapons work being done on Frontier in support of their other missions. The key point is that stockpile maintenance is firewalled, both in terms of funding and operations, from the other stuff and they are not the only contributor. DoE has always been a "big tent" of separate missions and I totally understand how it gets confusing. Its predecessor the AEC also had a weird mix of practically orthogonal goals. The non-weapons and non-nuclear missions have gotten a lot bigger in the last 30-40 years and are more or less operated independently of each other. NNSA is also functionally an independent agency within DoE, but it's important to note that they do fund pure science work too, with non-weapons related goals.