With these advances since the first workshop, it was clearly time to engage in a major reassessment of the state and direction of HPC system software. One of the realities dealt with by this ensemble of colleagues was the difficulty in harnessing resources. Simply put, this is because colleagues in all venues of the HPC community are over committed. With shrinking budgets and rapid shifts in priorities resulting in increased planning responsibilities, it is certain that the stress factors will only increase, at least in the near future. The community must find a better way of tasking itself towards common goals.
Time constants are too short to permit long lead times typical of top-down driven projects.
Another component of the solution is to augment the capabilities of government leadership in guiding initiatives by moving the tactical direction of such initiatives closer to the technical contributors. Overall objectives, approach, and project evaluation must remain within the corridors of government, but, if left in the critical path, contention for those conduits of high level decision can become barriers to rather than channels for accomplishment. A means of delegating as much responsibility to the community as can be safely done should be found to expedite and facilitate successful accomplishment of designated initiatives. If there was a single type of achievement of this workshop, it should be described as clarification. Few final answers were developed.