Future NSA spy machine

[John Young <jya@pipeline.com>]

Responding to msg by ianf@simple.sydney.sgi.com ("Ian 
Farquhar") on Mon, 22 Aug  9:38 AM

>You're talking about silicon fab lines here, Tim.  As 
>far as I am aware, Cray  has never fab it's own chips.  
>Indeed, most of their boards which I have  seen (I, II, 
>Y-MP/8 and Y-MP/EL) have used chips sourced from fairly 
>well-  known vendors, such as VLSI Technologies.
>
>The original series of systems (I, II and X-MP) 
>actually used huge numbers  of three types of chips.  
>From memory, one was a couple of NAND gates, one  was a 
>register chip, and the third was a couple of K of SRAM. 
> More recently,  the full Y-MP's have been implemented 
>in commercial ECL gate arrays (6500  gates per chip for 
>the full Y-MP's), and the original EL used CMOS 100K  
>arrays.  I have been trying to get one of the computing 
>industries choicest  pieces of marketting junk: the 
>Cray Y-MP Gate Array paperweight. :)  Of  course, given 
>my recent career change, I don't think one will be 
>coming  my way anytime soon for some strange 
>reason....


Ian,

Not asking for state or trade "secrets" but:

1.  Is MIPS new "supercomputer" R8000 in the running as array 
elements for super-supercomputers?

2.  Who is in the offing to succeed Cray and others as NSA's 
grateful suppliers?

3.  Will there be more on-base hardware and software 
production, a "circling of the wagons" as crypto becomes more 
public?

4.  And, thus, an even sharper (and more secret and 
competitive) line between governmental and commercial crypto 
hardware and code?

5.  Who is NSA (or other TLAs) underwriting as lesser known 
SRCs, not-for- or for-profit?  This is an update on where the 
jobs are for the "finest mathematicians" other than TLAs.

6.  Is NSA (like CIA and NRO) bifurcating into an even more 
super-supersecret arm and another friendly, public one in 
response to wider use of crypto and ostensible pressure from 
the likes of Senators Moynihan and Kerrey?  (And the recent RSA 
to-dos, murder threat, PKP lawsuit, are ploys.)

FYI, zero, hopefully minus, security clearance here.


Cheers,

John