A Collaborative Effort in Parallel Tool Design

The Parallel Tools Consortium (Ptools) brings together representatives from the federal, industrial, and academic sectors to address the issues of what parallel users need in software tool support and how user feedback can be incorporated effectively into the tool development cycle. Ptools is a direct response to past criticisms that parallel tool developers are working in isolation from the user community. One of the main activities is to sponsor tool development projects that respond to demonstrable user needs, result in tools which behave consistently across multiple platforms, involve the collaboration of vendors/researchers/users, and include development of public-domain prototypes. This paper outlines how the consortium operates as a forum where developers and users work together to identify tool needs and evolve tools responding to those needs.