云计算的下一场革命

    还记得泰坦吗？这可不是那支咸鱼翻身的橄榄球队。这是台超级计算机，去年11月，媒体大幅报道了泰坦一举成为全球最快的计算机。泰坦的计算速度非常恐怖，处理能力相当于50万台笔记本电脑。

    不过，如果没有合适的管理软件，如此强大的计算机也会英雄无用武之地。软件是未来高性能计算机的关键部分——不过它经常被忽略。随着越来越多的产品和服务迁往云端，软件对各行各业的影响将更加重要。自适应计算（Adaptive Computing）公司首席执行官罗比•克莱德称：“高性能计算和云计算之间的界限越来越模糊。”自适应计算是一家软件企业，产品能帮助超级计算机和云计算服务器提高效率。1月30日，该公司展示了自行研发的软件，能将泰坦的运行效率从70%提升到95%。克莱德称，用来优化泰坦的软件和用来优化云计算的软件非常像。

    这一点很重要，因为随着运算能力日益强大，最大的挑战将从提升原始处理能力变成优化已有系统。“我们即将进入一个运算几乎无止境的世界，”云存储公司Box的首席执行官艾伦•列维称。“管理运算的工具正成为下一个限幅器。”列维称，Box公司有数十名员工每天就在专门思考这一个问题。

    列维表示，计算机管理系统的市场不断增长，而且这一趋势将持续。随着市场开始需要管理计算机管理系统的系统等等，科技公司又会有新的业务。莱维说：“我们目前处于这个问题的新层次。而在此之上，又将有一个新层次，直到我们人类被淘汰。”他这么说并不完全是玩笑话。

    这类软件应帮助企业向用户提供更好的服务。克莱德说，以一家凭借云端程序提供语音识别服务的公司为例，如果支撑该服务的软件能高效地为各任务确定优先级，该服务就能更快地进行识别。而用户喜欢速度。

    这种看似遥远的软件还有一大好处：它将提升云端巨大运算能力的可访问性。 “三、四十年前，必须建造一台大型主机才能进行复杂的运算，”列维说。这些大型主机耗资数千万美元。“如今，完全可以在别人的云端进行虚拟运算。你只要为你在各个独立的时间段内使用的运算付费。”而随着软件日益改进，云管理日益完善，越来越多的人都可以用上它的运算能力。

    这样一来，各公司将能围绕运行复杂程序得出的发现进行创新，而不至于在这个过程中破产。这将反过来就能使各公司能提供更好的服务。直到计算机把我们全部顶替。（财富中文网）

    译者：项航

    Remember the Titan? No, not the comeback football team. The supercomputer that generated headlines last November for ranking as the world's fastest. Titan can crunch so many calculations, it has the equivalent processing power of 500,000 laptops.

    All that computing might is for naught without software capable of managing it. Software is a major—if often unsung—factor in the future of high-power computing. It will matter increasingly to businesses of all kinds as more and more products and services move into the cloud. "The line between high performance computing and cloud is blurring," says Rob Clyde, CEO of Adaptive Computing, a company that builds software to increase efficiency in supercomputers and cloud-based servers. Today, Adaptive revealed it developed the software that boosted Titan's efficiency from 70% to about 95%. The software used to make Titan tick is similar, Clyde says, to software that optimizes the cloud.

    That matters because as computing power gets more and more robust, the biggest challenge will switch from increasing raw processing brawn to optimizing the systems that we have. "We're moving to a world where computing is almost sort of indistinguishable from being infinite," says Aaron Levie, CEO of cloud storage company Box. "The tools to manage that computing are becoming the next limiter." Box, Levie says, devotes dozens of employees who spend their days thinking about that single problem.

    There is a growing market for systems that manage computers, Levie says, and that trend will continue. A slice of the tech economy will build out as the market begins to demand systems that manage the systems that manage computers, and so on. "We are now at a new meta layer of this problem. After this, it will be a new meta layer on top that, until we as humans are obsolete," Levie says. He is only partially joking.

    Such software should help companies deliver better services to consumers. For example, says Clyde, take a company that offers a speech-recognition service powered by programs in the cloud. If the company supports the service with software that efficiently prioritizes tasks, the service will find words faster. Consumers love speed.

    This remote-seeming software has another big benefit: It will boost the accessibility of massive computing power in the cloud. "Thirty or forty years ago, you had to basically build out a mainframe to run complex computations," Levie says. Those mainframes cost tens of millions of dollars. "Today, you can just run it in a virtual job in somebody else's cloud. You literally only pay for the amount of computing you use in a very discrete time period." Even better software, better cloud management, will let more and more people use its computational power.

    That will give companies the power to innovate around discoveries made from running involved programs without bankrupting them in the process. That should, in turn, enable companies to deliver better services. That is, of course, until the computers render us useless.