Glossary
Hypertext links here are to other glossary definitions.
- ACTS
-
Advanced Communications Technology Satellite, part of a joint
NASA-ARPA NREN
collaboration that will provide high speed
ATM/SONET
transmission, and will provide interface and operations experience in
mating high speed terrestrial communications systems with high speed
satellite communications systems
- Algorithm
-
A procedure designed to solve a problem. Scientific computing
programs contain algorithms.
- ARPA
-
Advanced Research Projects Agency, part of DOD (formerly DARPA,
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency)
- ASTA
-
Advanced Software Technology and Algorithms, a component of the
HPCC Program
- ATDnet
-
Advanced Technology Demonstrations Network, an ARPA project that
will make use of technology developed for and by gigabit testbeds
- ATM
-
Asynchronous Transfer Mode, a new telecommunications technology, also
known as cell switching, which is based on 53 byte cells
- Backbone Network
-
A high capacity electronic trunk connecting lower capacity networks,
e.g., NSFNET backbone
- Bit
-
Acronym for binary digit
- BRHR
-
Basic Research and Human Resources, a component of the HPCC Program
- Byte
-
A group of adjacent binary digits operated upon as a unit (usually
connotes a group of eight bits)
- CLNP
-
ConnectionLess Network Protocol
- Computer Engineering
-
The creative application of engineering principles and methods to the
design and development of hardware and software systems
- Computer Science
-
The systematic study of computing systems and computation. The body
of knowledge resulting from this discipline contains theories for
understanding computing systems and methods; design methodology,
algorithms, and tools; methods for the testing of concepts; methods of
analysis and verification; and knowledge representation and
implementation.
- Computational Science and Engineering
-
The systematic application of computing systems and computational
solution techniques to mathematical models formulated to describe and
simulate phenomena of scientific and engineering interest
- DOC
-
Department of Commerce
- DOD
-
Department of Defense
- DOE
-
Department of Energy
- ED
-
Department of Education
- EPA
-
Environmental Protection Agency
- ESnet
-
Energy Sciences Network
- FCCSET
-
Federal Coordinating Council for Science, Engineering, and Technology
- FDDI
-
Fiber Distributed Data Interface
- Flops
-
Acronym for floating point operations per second. The term "floating
point" refers to that format of numbers which is most commonly used
for scientific calculation. Flops is used as a measure of a computing
system's speed of performing basic arithmetic operations such as
adding, subtracting, multiplying, or dividing two numbers.
- FNC
-
Federal Networking Council
- Giga-
-
10** 9 or billions of ... (e.g., gigabits, gigaflops, gigaops)
- GOSIP
-
Government Open Systems Interconnection Profile
- Grand Challenge
-
A fundamental problem in science and engineering, with broad economic
and scientific impact, whose solution can be advanced by applying high
performance computing techniques and resources
- Heterogeneous system
-
A distributed system that contains more than one kind of computer
- High performance computer
-
At any given time, that class of general-purpose computers that are
both faster than their commercial competitors and have sufficient
central memory to store the problem sets for which they are designed.
Computer memory, throughput, computational rates, and other related
computer capabilities contribute to performance. In addition,
performance is often dependent on details of algorithms and on data
throughput requirements. Consequently, a quantitative measure of
computer power in large-scale scientific processing is difficult to
formulate and may change as the technology progresses.
- High performance computing
-
Encompasses advanced computing, communications, and information
technologies, including scientific workstations, supercomputer
systems, high speed networks, special purpose and experimental
systems, the new generation of large scale parallel systems, and
applications and systems software with all components well integrated
and linked over a high speed network
- HIPPI
-
High Performance Parallel Interface
- HHS
-
Department of Health and Human Services
- HPCC
-
High Performance Computing and Communications
- HPCCIT
-
High Performance Computing, Communications, and Information Technology
Subcommittee
- HPCS
-
High Performance Computing Systems, a component of the HPCC Program
- IINREN
-
-- see Interagency Internet
- IITA
-
Information Infrastructure Technology and Applications, a component of
the HPCC Program
- Interagency Interim NREN
-
-- see Interagency Internet
- Interagency Internet
-
The federally-subsidized part of the Internet that is directly used by
the HPCC Program. It includes NSFNET,
ESnet, and NSI. The
Interagency Internet is also the name of an element of the NREN
component of the HPCC Program, and is the successor to the Interagency
Interim NREN (IINREN).
- Internet
-
The global collection of interconnected, multiprotocol computer
networks including Federal, mid-level, private, and international
networks. The Interagency Internet is a part of the Internet, and
NSFNET, ESnet, and
NSI are part of the Interagency Internet.
- InterNIC
-
Internet Network Information Center
- Interoperability
-
The effective interconnection of two or more different computer
systems, databases, or networks in order to support distributed
computing and/or data exchange
- ISDN
-
Integrated Services Digital Network
- Kb/s
-
kilobits per second or thousands of bits per second
- LAN
-
Local Area Network
- Mb/s
-
Megabits per second or millions of bits per second
- MIMD
-
Multiple Input Multiple Data
- MPP
-
Massively parallel processor
- NAP
-
Network Access Point, a set of nodes interconnecting NREN Program
backbone networks
- NASA
-
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- National Challenge
-
A fundamental application that has broad and direct impact on the
Nation's competitiveness and the well-being of its citiziens, and that
can benefit by the application of HPCC technology and resources
- National Information Infrastructure (NII)
-
A nationwide infrastructure of high performance computing hardware and
information appliances containing massive volumes of computer
information, linked by high speed computer communications networks,
National Challenges applications software that is used to access and
apply this information, and a Nation of trained users
- NCO
-
National Coordination Office for the High Performance Computing and
Communications Program
- Network
-
Computer communications technologies that link multiple computers to
share information and resources across geographically dispersed
locations
- NIH
-
National Institutes of Health, part of HHS
- NIST
-
National Institute of Standards and Technology, part of DOC
- NLM
-
National Library of Medicine, part of NIH
- NOAA
-
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, part of DOC
- NREN
-
National Research and Education Network. The NREN is the realization
of an interconnected gigabit computer network systems devoted to
HPCC. NREN is also a component of the HPCC Program.
- NSA
-
National Security Agency, part of DOD
- NSF
-
National Science Foundation
- NSFNET
-
NSF Computer Network
- NSI
-
NASA Science Internet
- OC-3
-
Network transmission speed of 155 Mb/s
- OC-12
-
Network transmission speed of 622 Mb/s
- OMB
-
Office of Management and Budget
- Ops
-
Acronym for operations per second. Ops is used as a rating of the
speed of computer systems and components. In this report ops is
generally taken to mean the usual integer or
floating point operations
depending on what functional units are included in a particular system
configuration.
- OSI
-
Open Systems Interconnection
- OSTP
-
Office of Science and Technology Policy
- Parallel processing
-
Simultaneous processing by more than one processing unit on a single
application
- Peta-
-
10** 15 of ... (e.g., petabits)
- PMES
-
Committee on Physical, Mathematical, and Engineering Sciences
- Port
-
Transport a computer program from one computer systems to another
- Portable
-
Portable computer programs can be run with little or no change on many
kinds of computer systems.
- Prototype
-
The original demonstration model of what is expected to be a series of
systems. Prototypes are used to prove feasibility, but often are not
as efficient or well-designed as later production models.
- R&D
-
Research and Development
- Scalable
-
Scalable computing systems have the property that the size of a
system and its performance are proportional.
- SIMD
-
Single Instruction Multiple Data
- SONET
-
Synchronous Optical Network
- Tera-
-
10** 12 or trillions of ... (e.g., terabits, teraflops)
- T1
-
Network transmission of a DS1 formatted digital signal at a
rate of 1.5 Mb/s
- T3
-
Network transmission of a DS3 formatted digital signal at a
rate of 45 Mb/s
- vBNS
-
very high speed Backbone Network Services
- WAN
-
Wide Area Network