Software Vault: The Gold Collection/Software Vault - The Gold Collection (American Databankers) (1993).ISO/cdr11/wh930427.zip/4-27C.TXT

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From @lex-luthor.ai.mit.edu:[e-mail] Tue Apr 27 17:43:19 1993
Date: Tue, 27 Apr 1993 15:41-0400
From: The White House <[e-mail]>
Subject: J. H. Gibbons Testimony on Information Infrastructure
To: [e-mail],

                         The White House

             Office of Science and Technology Policy

________________________________________________________________
______________

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                             April 27, 1993

                  Statement of John H. Gibbons
        Director, Office of Science and Technology Policy

                           before the

           Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
                  U.S. House of Representatives

                         April 27, 1993

INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE AND HR1757, THE "HIGH PERFORMANCE
COMPUTING AND HIGH SPEED NETWORKING APPLICATIONS ACT OF 1993"

     Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, thank you for this
opportunity to testify on the Administration's High Performance
Computing and Communications Program and its important role in
assisting the development of the National Information
Infrastructure.

     This information infrastructure consists of computers,
computer data banks, fax machines, telephones, and video
displays linked by high-speed telecommunication links capable of
transmitting billions of bits of information in a second--an
entire Encyclopedia Britannica in a few seconds.  The computing
and networking technology that makes this possible is improving
at an unprecedented rate, expanding both our imaginations for
its use and its effectiveness.  Using these technologies, a
doctor who needs a second opinion could transmit a patient's
entire medical record--x-rays and ultrasound scans included--to
a colleague thousands of miles away, in less time that it takes
to send a fax today.  A school child in a small town could come
home and through a personal computer, reach into an electronic
Library of Congress--thousands of books, records, videos, and
photographs, all stored electronically.  At home, viewers could
choose whenever they wanted from thousands of different
television programs or movies.

     As you know, the Administration is committed to
accelerating the development of the National Information
Infrastructure (NII) this Nation needs for the 21st Century.
This infrastructure will provide Americans the information they
need, when they need it, whether in the form of text, images,
video, or sound.   These "information superhighways" will
revolutionize the way we work, learn, shop, and live.  They
promise to have an even greater impact than the interstate
freeways or the telephone system.  This infrastructure will be
as ubiquitous as the telephone system, but will be able to carry
information at least 1,000 times faster.  It will be able to
transmit not only voice and fax, but will also provide hundreds
of channels of interactive high-definition TV programming,
teleconferencing, and access to huge volumes of information.

     This technology is already in use in many of our research
laboratories where it is transforming the way research is done.
It allows scientists and engineers to access information from
computer databases scattered throughout the country and enables
them to use

supercomputers and research equipment thousands of miles away.
Perhaps most importantly, it enables researchers to collaborate
with colleagues around the country and around the world almost
as easily as if they were in the same building.

     This same telecommunications and computing technology could
someday be available to all Americans, provided there is
adequate public and private investment and forward-looking
government policies that promote its deployment and use.

     The Clinton Administration believes that the Federal
government has several important roles to play in assisting the
development of this infrastructure, which will be built and run
primarily by the private sector.  In many ways, the High
Performance Computing and Communications (HPCC) Program provides
the technological foundation upon which the Administration's
strategy for the NII rests.  On February 22, the President and
the Vice President unveiled a  Technology Initiative which
outlined the five parts of the Administration's strategy for
building the National Information Infrastructure:

     1)      Implement the High-Performance Computing and
          Communications Program, which is helping develop the
          basic technology needed for the NII.
     2)      Through the Information Infrastructure Technology and
          Applications program, work with industry,
          universities, and Federal labs to develop technologies
          needed to effectively utilize the NII for a wide range
          of applications.
     3)      Provide funding for networking pilot projects through
          the National Telecommunications and Information
          Administration (NTIA) of the Department of Commerce.
          NTIA will provide matching grants to assist states,
          local governments, universities and school systems,
          hospitals and other health care providers, and other
          non-profit entities in purchasing equipment and in
          undertaking planning related to telecommunications
          infrastructure development.  These pilot projects will
          demonstrate and explore the benefits of networking in
          the educational and library communities.
     4)      Promote dissemination of Federal information.  Every
          year, the Federal government spends billions of
          dollars collecting and processing information (e.g.
          economic data, environmental data, and technical
          information).  Unfortunately, while much of this
          information is very valuable, many potential users
          either do not know that it exists or do not know how
          to access it.  The Administration is committed to
          using new computer and networking technology to make
          this information more available to the taxpayers who
          paid for it.  This will require consistent Federal
          information policies designed to ensure that Federal
          information is made available at a fair price to as
          many users as possible while encouraging the growth of
          the information industry.
     5)      Reform telecommunications policies. Government
          telecommunication policy has not kept pace with new
          developments in telecommunications and computer
          technology.  As a result, government regulations have
          tended to inhibit competition and delay deployment of
          new technology and services.  For instance, without a
          consistent, stable regulatory environment, the private
          sector will hesitate

          to make the investments necessary to build the high-
          speed national telecommunications network that this
          country needs to compete successfully in the 21st
          Century.  To address this problem and others, the
          Administration is creating a high-level, interagency
          Information Infrastructure Task Force at the White
          House that will work with Congress, the private
          sector, and state and local governments to find
          consensus on and implement policy changes needed to
          accelerate deployment of the NII.

     As you can see, the HPCC Program is a critical part of the
Administration's effort to build the NII.  It is a key part of a
comprehensive strategy that will not only develop and
demonstrate new information technology, but also ensure that we
have intelligent, forward-looking policies that encourage the
private sector to deploy it and the public to use it.  Over the
next four years, the Administration is proposing to spend over
$5 billion on this Program.

Scope

     For more than 10 years, the Science, Space, and Technology
Committee has been a leader in the area of information
technology and information policy.  Legislation sponsored by
this Committee, the "Supercomputer Networking Study Act of
1986," mandated a report by the White House Office of Science
and Technology Policy (OSTP) that helped lay the foundation of
the High Performance Computing and Communications Program.  The
High-Performance Computing Act of 1991, first introduced by
then-Senator Gore and championed in the House by Representatives
Brown, Boucher, Valentine, and others, authorized and defined
that program.
     When then-Senator Gore proposed the idea of a High-
Performance Computing Initiative more than five years ago, most
people believed it would primarily benefit the research and
higher education communities.  And its first users have been
scientists, engineers, and university educators.  The
supercomputer technology developed under this program has helped
users to improve our understanding of global warming, develop
new drugs, design safer and more fuel-efficient cars and
aircraft, and access huge "digital libraries" of information.
The high-speed networking technology developed and demonstrated
by the HPCC Program and industry has accelerated the growth of
the Internet computer network and enabled millions of users not
just to exchange electronic mail, but to access computers,
digital libraries, and research equipment around the world.
This technology, which allows network users to conduct video
conferences at their desk, is enabling researchers around the
country to collaborate more effectively.

     The technology now used by the research and development
community could provide huge benefits in other sectors of our
economy.  Unfortunately, much of this technology is "leading-
edge" technology that is still experimental and difficult to
use.  That is why, in the Technology Initiative of February 22,
the Administration announced creation of a program to "assist
industry in the development of the hardware and software needed
to fully apply advanced computing and networking technology in
manufacturing, in health care, in life-long learning, and
libraries."  The Administration requested $47 million for FY93
and $96 million for FY94 for this program.  The legislation we
are considering today, as well as provisions in S. 4 and S. 473
being considered by the Senate, support these efforts.

     This new program will be part of the High-Performance
Computing and Communications Program, which is coordinated by
the High Performance Computing and Communications and
Information Technology (HPCCIT) Subcommittee of the Federal
Coordinating Council for Science, Engineering and Technology
(FCCSET), which I chair.  The HPCCIT has incorporated this new
program into the HPCC Program by adding a fifth component to the
program for FY94 and by putting more emphasis on applications
throughout the program.  This new component, Information
Infrastructure Technology and Applications (IITA), will develop
and apply high performance computing and communications
technologies to improve information systems needed to address
what we call "National Challenges"--major societal needs that
computing and communications technology can help us address--and
include design and manufacturing, health care, education,
digital libraries, environmental monitoring, energy demand
management, public safety, and national security. These National
Challenges are analogous to the "Grand Challenge" research
problems which have been the primary focus of the HPCC Program
to date.  In addition to addressing these problems, this new
component will support the development, with industry, of the
NII and the development of the computer, network, and database
technology needed to provide appropriate privacy and security
protection for users.

Components of the HPCC Program

     The President's FY 1994 budget requests $1 billion for the
HPCC Program plus $96 million for the new IITA component.  As I
mentioned, the Program consists of five integrated components.
Let me outline the goals and strategic priorities of each.

1. HPCS (High Performance Computing Systems) -- Its goal is to
extend U.S. technological leadership in high performance
computing through the development of scalable computing systems,
with associated software, capable of sustaining at least one
trillion operations per second (teraops) performance.  Scalable
parallel and distributed computing systems will be able to
support workstation users through the largest-scale
highest-performance systems.  Workstations will extend into
portable wireless interfaces as technology advances.

2. NREN (National Research and Education Network) -- Its goal is
to extend U.S. technology leadership in computer communications
by a program of research and development that advances the
leading edge of networking technology and services.  NREN will
widen the research and education community's access to high
performance computing and research centers and to electronic
information resources and libraries.  This will accelerate the
development and deployment of networking technologies by the
telecommunications industry.  This includes nationwide
prototypes for terrestrial, satellite, wireless and wireline
communications systems, including fiber optics, with common
protocol support and application interfaces.

3. ASTA (Advance Software Technology and Algorithms) -- Its
purpose is to demonstrate prototype solutions to Grand Challenge
problems through the development of advanced algorithms and
software and the use of HPCC resources.  Grand Challenge
problems are computationally intensive problems such as
forecasting weather, understanding climate changes, improving
environmental quality, building more energy-efficient cars and
airplanes, designing

better drugs, and conducting basic scientific research.

4. BRHR (Basic Research and Human Resources) -- This element
supports research, training, and education in computer science,
computer engineering and the computational sciences and enhance
the infrastructure through the addition of HPCC resources.
Initiation of pilot projects for K-12 and lifelong learning will
support expansion of the NII.

5. IITA (Information Infrastructure Technology and Applications)
-- Its purpose is to demonstrate prototype solutions to National
Challenge problems using HPCC enabling technologies.  This will
support integrated systems technology demonstration projects for
critical National Challenge applications through development of
intelligent systems interfaces.  These will include systems
development environments with support for virtual reality, image
understanding, language and speech understanding, and data and
object bases for electronic libraries and commerce.

     Close cooperation between the federal government and
industry is essential if technology developed by the HPCC
Initiative is to be effectively used to build an advanced NII.
Both individually and as members of the HPCC Initiative, the
participating agencies collaborate with industrial partners,
fund research and development in the private sector, and work
together to plan the HPCC Program.  In addition, my office is
working on a High Performance Computing Advisory Committee
consisting of representatives from the private sector and
academia and we note with approval your proposed legislation's
broadening of the membership of the advisory group to include
representation from the K-12 education community and from
consumer and public interest groups.

Agency Roles in the HPCC Program

     The HPCC Program has been a model of how Federal agencies
with different missions can work together effectively toward a
common goal.  The participating agencies have built a coherent,
coordinated program that is far greater than just the sum of its
parts.  They have eliminated wasteful duplication of effort and
research dollars and found and exploited opportunities for joint
projects.  This kind of synergy ensures the best use of Federal
research dollars.

     Allow me next to briefly outline for you the roles, the
accomplishments to date, the implementation plans, and the FY
1994 proposed activities for the agencies that take part in the
HPCC Program.  No single agency has expertise in all areas of
HPCC technology; each plays an essential role.  Agencies
participate in the HPCC Program in support of their individual
missions, overall Program goals, or both.  The agencies and
their roles (as outlined in a recent OSTP summary of the FCCSET
programs) are:

-- The Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) coordinates the
advanced computing and networking technologies needed by the
Program.  ARPA supports projects throughout academia and
industry to accelerate innovation and the transition of advanced
concepts into new technologies for use within the Program and
the defense and national technology base.  The

projects are developing the full range of technologies needed
for a scalable technology base of interoperating workstations,
networks, and parallel computing systems with mass storage,
systems software and development tools.  This technology will
enable a rapid transition from concepts to computational and
integrated system solutions in an open heterogeneous computing
environment.  This will enable solution of the Grand Challenges
and other National Challenges while providing the foundation for
a NII.

-- The National Science Foundation (NSF) supports advanced
fundamental research in HPCC technologies and their application
to science and engineering problems.  While coordinating the
NREN component, NSF is upgrading NSFNET backbone services,
deploying networking information services, increasing network
connections, and expanding gigabit research and development.
NSF supercomputer centers are collaborating towards a
"metacenter." NSF enables coordinated approaches to Grand
Challenge problems, and addresses algorithm and software
technology issues and providing computational research and
educational programs from the secondary schools through the
postdoctoral level.  Expanded IITA research includes distributed
databases and digital libraries, multimedia computing and
visualization, and image recognition.

-- The Department of Energy (DOE) funds HPCC research on
parallel systems, software, and gigabit networks technology.  It
funds Grand Challenge research in future energy sources, fusion
energy, combustion, environmental remediation, ground water
flow, petroleum reservoir modeling, atmospheric and ocean
modeling, and structural biology.  DOE supports high performance
computing centers and the Energy Sciences network, ESNET.
Collaborations between DOE investigators and industry include a
joint effort by DOE, NASA, six major industrial firms to
establish the National Storage Laboratory, which addresses the
pressing mass data storage problems.  The DOE has education and
training programs in computational sciences and other HPCC
technology areas for secondary schools through the doctoral
level.  IITA research includes areas such as energy demand
management and telecommuting.

-- The National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA)
high performance computing centers address Grand Challenge
problems such as improving advanced aerospace vehicles
(including high speed civil transport); simulating an entire
vehicle through the full flight envelope; advanced robotics for
space exploration; modeling the interactions among the
atmosphere, oceans, and land masses; deploying NASA's high
performance NREN; and managing huge volumes of space data.  NASA
coordinates the ASTA component's software sharing activity, and
participates in gigabit network research.  NASA conducts
educational pilot programs with elementary and secondary schools
and supports university research.  IITA efforts include
increasing accessibility of remotely sensed data and developing
technologies to manipulate these large volumes of data.

-- The National Institutes of Health (NIH), through its National
Library of Medicine, National Center for Research Resources,
Division of Computer Research and Technology, and the Biomedical
Supercomputer Center of the National Cancer Institute, develops
algorithms and software in molecular biology (including
comparison of genetic and protein sequence data) and biomedical
imaging for high performance systems; develops prototype
biomedical digital  image

libraries; provides NREN access to researchers and medical
centers; supports training at all levels in high performance
computing for medical applications and provides fellowships in
medical informatics.  NIH IITA efforts will expand technology
development for telemedicine, medical record management, and
medical imagery.

-- The National Security Agency (NSA), Department of Defense,
conducts research in all aspects of highly heterogeneous
computing environments, including specialized high speed
hardware. NSA focuses on interoperability, increased
performance, network and computer security, mass storage, and
gigabit networks.  NSA promotes research in high performance
computing including superconductivity and ultra
high-speed-switching at its own facilities, in industry, and at
universities.

-- The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA),
Department of Commerce, conducts Grand Challenge research in
climate prediction and weather forecasting, and archives and
disseminates environmental data, including climatic data for the
Global Change Research Program.  By exploiting the computing
power of scalable parallel systems, global ocean and atmosphere
models will accurately represent weather fronts and ocean
eddies, and distortions due to clouds can be eliminated.  In
support of this research, NOAA is acquiring scalable systems and
enhancing NREN connectivity.  Within the IITA component, NOAA is
investigating environmental monitoring, prediction and
assessment applications, and expanding efforts to make its
environmental data more accessible.

-- The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) conducts Grand
Challenge research in air and water pollution management and in
ecological assessment in a distributed, heterogeneous high
performance computing environment.  The research focuses on
improving environmental decision-making and policy support
tools, improving NREN connectivity, and developing and
implementing training programs, particularly for state and
environmental groups.  EPA is integrating user-friendly advanced
assessment tools into a high performance computing environment,
which will include a scalable parallel system to enable more
complex multipollutant and multimedia assessments.

-- The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST),
Department of Commerce, develops instrumentation and performance
measurement methods for high performance computing and
networking systems; develops security policies and technologies
for the NREN;  facilitates the development of appropriate
voluntary standards; and designs and implements methods for
organizing, documenting, and  disseminating software.  As
coordinating agency for manufacturing applications for the IITA
component, NIST will establish an advanced manufacturing systems
and networking testbed.  NIST will work closely with DOC's
National Telecommunications and Information Administration
(NTIA).  NTIA has a key role in developing Federal
telecommunications policy and funding networking pilot projects
at schools, libraries, hospitals and health care providers, and
other non-profit institutions.

-- The Department of Education (ED) sponsors program initiatives
and activities through its regional laboratories and research
centers.  The Department will provide information to educators

and students in K-12 and lifelong learning about high
performance computing and networking application resources.  It
promotes initiatives in training, curriculum development,
library connectivity and research and development projects that
support the emerging information infrastructure.

HR1757 - "High Performance Computing and High Speed Networking
Applications Act of                 1993"

     HR1757 is important, forward-looking legislation and is
largely consistent with the Administration's proposal for
developing the nation's information infrastructure.  I commend
the Chairman and the cosponsors of this bill for their efforts
and their vision.  This legislation can help accelerate the
development of a National Information Infrastructure.

     I believe that the legislation being considered today is
generally consistent with the Administration's goals for the
HPCC Program and the development of the National Information
Infrastructure.  It supports the expansion of the HPCC Program
and additional emphasis on development of applications
technology for manufacturing, health care, education, libraries,
and other sectors of the economy.  It also authorizes additional
Federal funding for connecting schools and non-profit
organizations to high-speed networks.  The legislation includes
very important provisions for improving the dissemination of
Federal information.

     We share the committee's desire that scientific and
technical information be made more available to the taxpayers
who paid for it.  Scientific and technical information (STI) is
a multi-billion dollar annual enterprise which provides the
critical raw material of research and development as well as a
tangible output of our R&D investment.  It is estimated that
between 2 percent and 4 percent of each Federal research dollar
is spent on the management of STI.  When effectively mobilized,
STI programs can provide input to the solution of major
technical problems.  From large earth observing experiments to
genome databases to computational science research to using
scientific visualization for new scientific insights, rapid
advances in information technologies combined with an increased
volume of data and information have brought renewed recognition
of the importance of information management in the science and
technology program life cycle.

     HR1757 was just introduced on April 21st.  My office and
all of the other interested agencies have already begun to
carefully review the details of the Bill.  The Administration
will provide the Committee with its views on the Bill as soon as
the review has been completed.

Conclusion

     Thank you again for this opportunity to appear here today.
The Administration is committed to the rapid development of the
National Information Infrastructure.  This commitment is
reflected in both the President's Technology Initiative and
Administration's FY94 budget

request.  Your proposed legislation will help provide greater
access to the Internet and accelerate development of
applications of high-performance computing and communications
technology in the areas of primary and secondary education,
health care, libraries, and access to government information.
We look forward to working with the Committee on this
legislation and on the development of the National Information
Infrastructure. There are few initiatives that offer as many
potential benefits to all Americans.