On 03/08/2012 02:45 PM, Prentice Bisbal wrote: > Man climbed the mountain, because it was there, and techies will > continue to build clusters and other things out of unusual hardware > merely because they are there, too.
I'm not certain the mountain metaphor follows. For instance, I'm not going to jump out of the window next to my desk just because it is there, because surviving it will be challenging, or because it will entertain people watching me attempt it. There's more going on with mountains and with this iPad clustering. > At the risk of being flamed, I think some of you are missing the point. > Neither the Register article or Dongarra's article were advocating for > the building clusters from iPads, I think they only meant to show how > far computing hardware has come in terms of power and cost. I remember reading a similar article comparing TI-83s and Eniac a long time ago. It was excellent, interesting, pointed, and hit on the latter point you mention (progress of computer science). However, that article didn't suggest that we should take TI-83s and make a cluster out of them, or even worse, that doing so is appealing for power reasons. Whether or not the article on the Reg argues to use them as a cluster is up in the air, but the the NYT article absolutely suggests that there could be some benefits to it: snip "Meanwhile, the fact that the iPad runs off a battery and is air-cooled has given Dr. Dongarra some ideas, like building a supercomputer composed of a couple of stacks of the tablets. ... “It could be done and provide a very power-friendly cluster,” he said. snip > To say that people should only build clusters out of the proper hardware > is like telling artists to throw out their paints and brushes since we > now have cameras, that do a better job than they can. Again, weird analogy IMHO. I don't pay an artist to have a picture of something so I know what it looks like or can remember it later. If this was the 1200s and we didn't have photographs, then yes, that would be exactly what would happen. While back then many got portraits who could afford them, and higher prices were paid for higher fidelity pictures relative to reality, as soon as cameras hit the scene the demand lessened and artists indeed put down their brushes for that purpose. Modern art is (mostly) interpretive, and tries as hard as possible to avoid doing work that cameras can do. > BTW - I'd never waste my time building a cluster out of iPads, but I > defend the right of others to do so if that's what turns them on. I'm right there with you Prentice -- I'd even enjoy reading an article about just such a cluster if one was built, for the same absurdity factor that the furbie cluster was supported. Weird things are fun. But I don't defend the right of intelligent people to mislead the public (via the Reg and NYT) into actually believing there is something scientifically appealing about doing supercomputing with iPads. Sorry Apple, even you guys can't make hardcore computer science chic. It just doesn't work that way. Best, ellis _______________________________________________ Beowulf mailing list, Beowulf@beowulf.org sponsored by Penguin Computing To change your subscription (digest mode or unsubscribe) visit http://www.beowulf.org/mailman/listinfo/beowulf
