[Links of the day] 16/06/2016 : HPC fabric routing, Software Architecture , 1977 cloud paper

• Transitively Deadlock-Free Routing Algorithms : interesting routing solution for the BULL (now Atos) BXI fabric for HPC system. 4-level rearrangeable non-blocking fat-tree which support up to 64 800 nodes, 11 160 switches, 194 400 inter-switches links. Problem : this represent 50GB of routing table, and errors occurs (often). Obviously recomputing the routing tables for each fault is not an option. The authors propose a process using offline/online recompute with non blocking routing table update process. Interestingly enough the proposed solution looks a lot like online linux kernel patch update system. [slides]
• Architect's Clue Bucket : Big slide deck by Ruth Malan looking at sfotware architecture and how to use Clues to deliver great product. The author look at the type of clue: design principles, heuristics, tipds, hints... How to organise them : mapping the clue landscape and finally where and how to look for clues
• 1977 Cloud : Insightful paper describing what would be today's modern cloud solution.. Sometimes I think that the 70s were caught into a time warp caused by hardware lag. Software tech advanced way faster than the hardware tech and we just spent the past 30-40 years waiting for it to catch up. Sadly, we forgot (and reinvented the wheel many time) while waiting.