KAOS Hardware Development & Maintenance Facility, 695 Anderson Tower

A high-performance computing system is not created by accident, but by the careful design and implementation of interactions between Compilers, Hardware Architectures, and Operating Systems. The University of Kentucky's KAOS group works to create, demonstrate, and disseminate technologies that can improve performance or provide new capabilities by integrating different aspects of computer system design. This systems research is not limited to systems hardware and software, but also includes working with application developer collaborators to port, tune, and enhance their codes.

Our creation of new technologies to improve the performance of computers is primarily aimed at making theoretical advances. However, obscure interactions between the many complex component susbsytems within a computer system often have a very significant impact on performance, so we feel it is critical to confirm our theoretical advances using prototype implementations of complete systems. For this reason, and also to facilitate technology transfer, we build a lot of specialized and prototype hardware; for example, our group has produced 19 generations of Aggregate Function Network (AFN) hardware. We also need to be able to perform regular maintenance on the hardware of our supercomputer testbeds (which are primarily housed in the KAOS Supercomputer Machine Room). These two vital functions are performed in the KAOS Hardware Development & Maintenance Facility.

Vital Statistics

Room Number
695 Anderson Tower (formerly Anderson Hall)
Phone Number
wireless extension of 577; (859) 257 4972
Professor-in-charge
Hank Dietz
Additional emergency contact
Tim Mattox, "senior" RA
Approximate sq. ft.
180
Miscellaneous info.
Parts cabinets, assembly & soldering station, etc.

The Aggregate. The only thing set in stone is our name.