Historical Perspective: Getting to Know the SC Perennials

The SC Perennials is a name affectionately given to the 18 hardy individuals who have demonstrated an unswerving commitment to the HPC community, having attended all 27 of the SC conferences, starting with SC88.  The Perennials just keep coming back – year after year after.

Just as a point of reference, we refer to SC15 as the 27th annual SC conference, but for these individuals, it will actually be their 28th consecutive appearance.

The SC Perennials have seen a lot of change over the years and their contributions, past and present have helped the SC conference in many ways - from program responsibilities to committee roles to evangelizing the importance of HPC.  Their roles in the community and their years of volunteer service on various conference committees is noteworthy.  Some of the names on this list need no introduction – you will recognize them as HPC community legends.

That first event, SC88, which featured a keynote from Seymour Cray, had 1,495 attendees, 36 exhibitors and used a small hotel ballroom for the exhibit hall. This year, at SC15, we anticipate more than 10,000 attendees, more than 350 exhibitors, and we’ll be occupying more than 140,000 sq. ft. of exhibit hall space.

Leading up to SC15, we’ll be posting a series of articles based on interviews with the SC Perennials in which we’ll share some of their favorite memories, discuss some of the SC conference highlights over the years, and bring you an entertaining perspective on many “cool” things to know about the history of this amazing conference.

We hope you enjoy this rare treat of getting to know some more about the SC conference history, as well as getting to know this group of colorful, dedicated SC conference attendees.

SC Perennials (listed in alphabetical order)

• Mike Bernhardt / Intel
• Bill Boas / System Fabric Works
• Vito Bongiorno / Cray Inc.
• Jim Bottum / Clemson Univ. / Internet2
• Maxine Brown / Univ. of Illinois at Chicago
• Jack Dongarra / Univ. of Tennessee and ORNL
• John L. Gustafson
• Fred Johnson
• Anne Marie Kelly / IEEE Computer Society
• John M. Levesque / Cray Inc.
• Allen D. Malony / Univ. of Oregon
• Kenichi Miura / NII / LBNL
• Steve Poole
• Ralph Roskies / Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center
• Horst Simon / LBNL
• Burton Smith
• Quentin F. Stout / Univ. of Michigan
• Steve Wallach