Abstract

Exascale level computers might be available in less than a decade. Computer architects are already thinking of, and planning to achieve such levels of performance. It is reasonable to expect that researchers and engineers will carry out scientific and engineering computations more complex than ever before, and will attempt breakthroughs not possible today. If the size of the problems solved on such machines scales accordingly, we may face new issues related to precision, accuracy, performance, and programmability. The paper examines some relevant aspects of this problem. I.