Management of PDE-software for supercomputing

Many scientific processes can be modeled by a solution of partial differential equations. The increasing capabilities of modern computer systems strongly contribute to the computations of numerical solutions. Strategies for efficient problem solving in this field can be established with the concept of problem solving environments. A problem solving environment (pse) can be defined as a human interface to hardware and software to assist the user in the solution of a given class of problems.The PDE pse developed at KFA Juelich/ZAM intends to support the user in the improvement and design of new components for the environment as well as in the accurate and efficient solution of partial differential equations. Predefined commands and several model problems lead to a more intensive concentration on the problem, because routine activities are reduced. The problem description becomes the central point of the work. Special emphasis is given to interactive pre- and postprocessing; i.e. syntactical check on the correctness of the formulated problems and support for the submission of jobs to the appropriate computer systems (IBM 3081 and CRAY X-MP). An interface to graphics software provides easy-to-use facilities for the representation of numerical results