SC07 - What a Blast!
By ryan | November 28, 2007
Two weeks ago, I was fortunate enough to attend SC07. SC07 is a huge, annual high performance computing convention that’s held at a different venue each year. As the main information website states,
SC07 is the premier international conference on high performance computing, networking, storage, and analysis.
Following the traditions set with the first SC conference in 1988, SC07 is expanding the frontiers of High Performance Computation by introducing a new cluster challenge that combines the computation, networking, storage, and analysis elements into a single competition. […] Attendees become immersed in the latest state-of-the-field developments in technology, applications, vendor products, research results, national policy and national/ international initiatives. SC07 is the one place attendees can see tomorrow’s technology being used to solve world-class challenge problems today.
I couldn’t have said it any better. Thankfully, I was a student volunteer for the convention, which brought me many perks. I didn’t have to pay for a place to stay or to attend the conference, only the flight to the convention, which was held in Reno, Nevada this year. The scenery was beautiful and the weather was cool, but comfortable, even for a Florida boy like me. Another great thing was I got a free backpack and jacket just for attending, which are both awesome!
What the student volunteers do, was a little convoluted at first, but cleared up as the convention started. We were mainly used to help with the administration of the conference. We would do head counts for tutorials and workshops, hand out and collect surveys of particular workshops, assist speakers with a/v equipment, help with registration, and help any confused or lost people wandering around if we could. We also got the opportunity to sit in on some sessions that we had a particular interest in while working, getting the best of both worlds; working, but actually learning and listening to things that fascinated us. Overall, it was an amazing experience. If you care to read a little more, I go into detail some of the exhibits and sessions I sat in on and found quite interesting in the following pages.
Topics: Technology, Uncategorized |