Customers, Partners Run Top Supercomputers on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for High Performance Computing

World’s three most powerful supercomputers run SUSE Linux Enterprise from Novell

WALTHAM, Mass.— Jun 2008— Supercomputers around the world are running on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server from Novell®. According to TOP500, a project that tracks and detects trends in high-performance computing, SUSE Linux Enterprise is the Linux* of choice on the world’s largest HPC supercomputers today. Of the top 50 supercomputers worldwide, 40 percent are running on SUSE Linux Enterprise, including the top three – IBM* eServer Blue Gene at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, IBM eServer BlueGene/P (JUGENE) at the Juelich Research Center and SGI* Altix 8200 at the New Mexico Computing Applications Center.

Leveraging the economics of open source software and low cost hardware, Novell, together with its partners, is bringing the same high performance computing capabilities utilized in supercomputers to enterprises and mid-market customers in a range of industries, including manufacturing, research and academic organizations.

Customers such as Audi, MTU Aero Engines, NASA Advanced Supercomputing Division, Porsche Informatik, Seoul National University, Swinburne University of Technology, Tokyo Institute of Technology and Wehmeyer are running supercomputers and computer clusters on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server to handle mission-critical workloads with minimal downtime.

Three supercomputers at the NASA Advanced Supercomputing Division currently operate on SUSE Linux Enterprise from Novell. These computers are used to evaluate next-generation technology to meet NASA’s engineering and science requirements, control system operation and launch programs, and support NASA’s aeronautics, science and space operations initiatives. NASA’s next supercomputer, scheduled for completion this summer, will also run on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server and when deployed will be one of the largest SGI Altix ICE systems, on par with the current third-ranked most powerful supercomputer.

“At NASA we are working to solve some of science’s most complex challenges, so an operating system that can help us achieve the highest level of computational functionality is very important,” said William Thigpen, engineering branch chief in the NASA Advanced Supercomputing Division. “In selecting an operating system, performance and flexibility are two of our top considerations. The right operating system helps us to push the boundaries of computing performance and bring new levels of innovation to our space, science and aeronautics programs.”

Partners Leverage SUSE Linux Enterprise
Companies like Appro International, Atipa Technologies, Cluster Resources, HP, Penguin Computing, SGI and Teradata are incorporating SUSE Linux Enterprise Server into the high-performance computing solutions they are providing to their own customers.
“We recently introduced a new family of platforms from entry-level to active-enterprise data warehouses that addresses many customer needs,” said Scott Gnau, chief development officer, Teradata Corporation. “Our solutions are designed to drive powerful business intelligence and real-time decisioning applications, including fraud detection and prevention, customer segmentation, human resources and forecasting. Our solutions run on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server from Novell, which, thanks to its extreme scalability, reliability, flexibility and ease of use, is the optimal Linux operating system for our customers’ businesses. We selected Novell and its SUSE Linux Enterprise platform because of its full range of industry-leading Linux services to support large-scale, mission-critical enterprises.”

Irene Qualters, SGI senior vice president of software, said, “At SGI, our focus is on high-performance computing and robust scalability, and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server is the operating system of choice for many of our Altix and Altix XE customers. As the requirements for high-performance computing continue to grow more complex across industries, the collaboration between SGI and Novell ensures that SUSE Linux Enterprise will continue to be the leading operating system for high-performance clusters that meet those new business needs today.”

Michael A. Jackson, president of Cluster Resources Inc., said, “Our partnership with Novell is helping to overcome the complexity and supportability limitations of the HPC market. The resulting Moab Cluster Builder for SUSE Linux Enterprise installs a turnkey, HPC-optimized version of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server with easy-to-use resource and workload management. In addition, with Novell’s interoperability alliance with Microsoft, we can enable a dynamic hybrid OS cluster. This next-generation solution causes a single cluster to be a mix of both SUSE Linux Enterprise and Windows and to dynamically change the OS mix based on the workload submitted. Novell is truly a centerpiece of both next-generation HPC and making it easy to use, commercially reliable and supportable.”

SUSE Linux Enterprise has been a leader in the high performance computing market for more than a decade, based on the strong engineering heritage of the distribution.

“SUSE Linux Enterprise has become the HPC operating system of choice, thanks to its scalability and performance capabilities and the wide variety of open source software and development tools available,” said Carlos Montero-Luque, vice president of product management for Open Platform Solutions at Novell. “By leveraging industry-standard servers and clusters running SUSE Linux Enterprise, customers and partners can build and deploy the world’s best HPC-class products and applications.”

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