Operating System of the VX/VPP300/VPP700 Series of Vector-Parallel Supercomputer Systems
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UDC 681.3.06 Operating System of the VX/VPP300/ VPP700 Series of Vector-Parallel Supercomputer Systems VYuji Koeda (Manuscript received April 29, 1997) The computers used in science and technology are generally either low-end, high cost-performance machines owned by individual research and development sec- tions, or high-end ultra high-speed machines. This paper describes the features of the UXP/V operating system of the VX/ VPP300/VPP700 series of vector parallel supercomputers, which were developed to flexibly cover the requirements for science and technology computing. It also looks at the following important topics regarding vector parallel supercomputers : - The method of allocating resources such as the CPU and memory - The scheduling technique for batch processing - The technology used to achieve high-speed I/O processing and network process- ing This paper also describes a function for easy installation and administration and a strengthened operational management function for the computer center. 1. Introduction 2. Development history The cost effectiveness of science and technol- The history of UXP/V began with UTS/M, ogy calculation environments has rapidly im- which is a UNIXNote1) system that operates on a proved due to increases in the processing speeds mainframe. UTS/M was based on the UTS, which of high-end EWSs and the falling prices of super- was developed between 1982 and 1985 by Amdahl computers and minicomputers. These changes Corporation in the USA as a UNIX system on have encouraged more research departments and Amdahl’s mainframe. At first, UTS/M was based researchers to use science and technology calcu- on SVR2Note2), and was supplied as a business-ori- lation machines. The VX, VPP300, and VPP700 ented UNIX system for mainframes; then a UNIX series vector-parallel supercomputers were devel- system for supercomputers was requested. In 1990, oped to meet the demands for very high process- VPONote3) was supplied as an additional function ing speeds to perform complicated, high-level cal- of vector processing so that the UNIX system could culations. be used on a supercomputer. This paper looks at problems connected with In 1989, the System V UNIX and the BSD the operating system of vector-parallel super- UNIX were unified into SVR4Note4). Taking this computers, and explains the development of UXP/ opportunity, we developed UXP/M by introducing V, which is the operating system of the VX, the base of UTS/M into SVR4. We released UXP/ VPP300, and VPP700 series. M in 1991. Note1) UNIX is a registered trademark in the Note2) SVR2 is an abbreviation of UNIX System V United States and other countries licensed Release 2. exclusively through X/Open Company Lim- Note3) VPO is an abbreviation of Vector Processor ited. Option. Note4) SVR4 is an abbreviation of UNIX System V Release 4. FUJITSU Sci. Tech. J.,33,1,pp.15-23(June 1997) 15 Y. Koeda: Operating System of the VX/VPP300/VPP700 Series of Vector-Parallel Supercomputer Systems Then, calculation capabilities about 20 times be easier to operate, install, and manage. better than that of a conventional single proces- 1) Open architecture sor or TCMP-typeNote5) vector computer was re- This operating system is based on SVR4, quired in aircraft and weather service fields. In which is the standard UNIX operating system. A response, in 1993, we developed and supplied the standard GUI and language environment, such VPP500 series of distributed-memory-type vector- as X11Note6), Motif Note7), Fortran90, ANSI C, and parallel supercomputers. This series has the char- Message Passing Library are used. Moreover, the acteristics of both a conventional vector computer function for vector-parallel supercomputer pro- and a new parallel processing machine. The op- cessing is extended by maintaining an open ar- erating system for this series consists of two parts: chitecture. This improves the connectivity and UXP/M, which supports the standard UNIX func- operation of the system as a calculation server tion in a front-end processor, and a parallel oper- under a distributed system environment. ating system in a back-end processor for batch 2) Higher performance processing only. Files can be accessed at high speed using the Then, we developed UXP/V for the VX, VPP300, disk array unit, large-capacity high-speed file sys- and VPP700 series to provide flexible support of vari- tem, and software striping function. ous applications in research and development de- This system can be connected to a LAN con- partments and superior cost effectiveness. UXP/V forming to ANSI standard HIPPI (800 megabits is a standalone UNIX operating system with ex- per second)Note8) or ATM-LAN (155.2 megabits per tended parallel and vector functions. It can be stored second)Note9). Such a connection increases the net- in each processor. We began sales of UXP/V in 1995. work transmission speed, which is important in a distributed system environment. Moreover, the 3. Aim of development performance of application programs is enhanced The VX, VPP300, and VPP700 series are dis- by using the compiler, which has superior optimi- tributed-memory-type vector-parallel super- zation techniques, and by using the tuning tools computers appropriate for high-speed processing for vectorization and parallel processing creation. of large amounts of data in science and technol- 3) Easier installation and management ogy calculations. Because these systems can be The operating system and basic software extended scalably according to the application, products are provided on disk. The user can start they can be used under various conditions. That using this product by performing the minimum is, these systems can be used as departmental sys- environment setup at installation. This system tems exclusively used in research and develop- can be started and stopped using the power ON/ ment departments or as center systems shared OFF button, which enables the system to be eas- by various research and development depart- ily used as a departmental system. Online manu- ments. The operating system for the VX, VPP300, als are enhanced so that required information can and VPP700 series must have a higher perfor- be effectively retrieved from a workstation. mance, superior operation management func- 4) Superior center operation management func- tions, and wider application fields; also it must tion Note5) TCMP is an abbreviation of Tightly Coupled Note7) Motif is trademark of Open Software Foun- Multi-Processing. dation, Inc. Note6) X11 is an abbreviation of X Window System Note8) HIPPI is an abbreviation of High Perfor- V11. X Window System is a trademark of X mance Parallel Interface. Consortium, Inc. Note9) ATM is an abbreviation of Asynchronous Transfer Mode. 16 FUJITSU Sci. Tech. J.,33,1,(June 1997) Y. Koeda: Operating System of the VX/VPP300/VPP700 Series of Vector-Parallel Supercomputer Systems Interference between batch processing and 4. Characteristics of the operating interactive processing is prevented. The jobNote10) system management function, which is the nucleus of cen- 4.1 Standalone parallel operating ter operation, is enhanced for flexible handling of system various types of operating conditions. The center The VX, VPP300, and VPP700 series are operation management functions such as the se- supercomputers having two or more processing el- curity function (AUDIT and ACL) are enhanced. ements (PEs) connected through a high-speed Also, the automatic operation function is enhanced crossbar network. Figure 1 shows the system con- (system-start by power-on and system-stop by figuration. Each PE consists of a scalar unit, vec- power-off can be automatically performed at a tor unit, main memory, data transfer unit, and specific time using the calendar function of the other units. Standard UNIX with the extended hardware). parallel processing function and extended vector 5) Continuity of resources processing function operates on all PEs. There- For inheritance of user resources at system fore, every PE can perform vector processing, par- changeover, binary compatibility with the VPP500 allel processing, and interactive processing. A PE vector-parallel supercomputers and source code to which input/output devices such as disk drives, compatibility with the VP and VPX series vector tape units, and network units can be connected is supercomputers are assured. also called an IOPENote11). If there are a large num- Crossbar network IOPE(Input/Output PE) PE UXP/V(conforming to UNIX SVR4) UXP/V(conforming to UNIX SVR4) - Parallel processing - Parallel processing - Vector processing - Vector processing Disk drives - High-speed communication function - High-speed communication function Input/output NQS Shell NQS Shell subsystem Batch Interactive Batch Interactive processing processing processing processing Tape unit Compilation Execution Compilation Execution LAN network Fig. 1— Standalone parallel operating system. Note10) A job is a series of tasks to be executed for a Note11) IOPE is an abbreviation of Input/Output PE. user. FUJITSU Sci. Tech. J.,33,1,(June 1997) 17 Y. Koeda: Operating System of the VX/VPP300/VPP700 Series of Vector-Parallel Supercomputer Systems ber of PEs, a single IOPE may not be able to handle able for workstations should be executed on work- all of their I/O requests, and the many accesses to stations. For example, the development environ- system disks via the IOPE will lengthen the sys- ment and GUI software products should be run tem start-up time. To solve these problems, two on workstations as much as possible. To facili- or more IOPEs are prepared to distribute the disk tate this, software products that must cooperate and network load. Also, system disks are con- with workstations must be prepared. Some ex- nected to two or more IOPEs so that the PEs us- amples of these software products are the VPP ing the system disks are grouped. The start-up Workbench (for supplying a program development time for a large-scale system can be shortened by environment with a GUI equivalent to that for starting the system in parallel in group units.