President's Information Technology Advisory Committee
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September 11, 2000
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Co-Chairs:
Raj Reddy
Irving Wladawsky-Berger
Members:
Eric A. Benhamou
Vinton Cerf
Ching-chih Chen
David Cooper
Steven D. Dorfman
David Dorman
Robert Ewald
Sherrilynne S. Fuller
Hector Garcia-Molina
Susan L. Graham
James N. Gray
W. Daniel Hillis
Robert E. Kahn
Ken Kennedy
John P. Miller
David C. Nagel
Edward H. Shortliffe
Larry Smarr
Joe F. Thompson
Leslie Vadasz
Andrew J. Viterbi
Steven J. Wallach |
The Honorable William J. Clinton
President of the United States
The White House
Washington, DC 20500
Dear Mr. President:
The President's Information Technology Advisory Committee (PITAC)
is very pleased to submit the second report in the series of follow-ups
to our February 1999 report to the President, Information Technology
Research: Investing in Our Future. Open Source Software for High End
Computing highlights our recommendations for a research strategy that
uses open source software development as the new model for answering
America's high end computing software needs.
In our February 1999 report, we noted with concern a growing national
vulnerability based on the inadequacies of the current system to build
reliable and secure software while the diversity and sophistication
of the software base becomes increasingly pervasive in society. The
PITAC believes the open source development model represents a viable
strategy for producing high quality software through a mixture of
public, private, and academic partnerships. This open source approach
permits new software to be openly shared, possibly under certain conditions
determined by a licensing agreement, and allows users to modify, study,
or augment the software's functionality, and then redistribute the
modified software under similar licensing restrictions. By its very
nature, this approach offers government the additional promise of
leveraging its software research investments with expertise in academia
and the private sector.
In the attached report, we focus exclusively on software development
for high end computing (sometimes referred to as high-performance
computing or supercomputing) because of its critical importance to
U. S. national security and science and engineering research. Our
1999 analysis revealed that while there were a number of high end
applications ripe for exploration, the field was in need of substantial
innovations in application-development software, algorithms, programming
methods, component technologies, and architecture.
The report makes three recommendations. First, the Federal government
should aggressively encourage the development of open source software
for high end computing. Adopting this recommendation will require
a technical assessment of the software needs for high end computing
as well as an innovative management plan and funding model for supporting
this development. Second, a "level playing field" must be
created within the government procurement process to facilitate open
source development. Third, an analysis of open source licensing agreements
is needed, with an ultimate goal of agreeing upon a single common
licensing agreement for open source software applications.
Exploring alternative software development models for high end applications
will allow the Nation to make significant progress towards addressing
the growing national need to ensure software development practices
and techniques which will result in reliable and secure systems. We
are encouraged to see some high end computing and reliable software
development research topics among the priorities in your proposed
FY2001 budget for Information Technology Research and Development.
However, we urge you to implement the strategy outlined in our report
in order to strengthen the effectiveness of federal investments and
policies in this arena.
Thank you for the continued opportunity to advise you on these and
other important issues for America's information technology-driven
economy.
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Sincerely,
Raj Reddy, Ph.D.
PITAC, Co-Chair |
Irving Wladawsky-Berger, Ph.D.
PITAC, Co-Chair |
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