Cell/B.E. Education & Training Wiki

A collaborative site for education and training information related to Cell/B.E. (Cell).  Anyone can view the content of this wiki, however if you would like to contribute you will need to Log in. If you can not find answers to your technical questions here, check out the Cell/B.E. Architecture Forum or access the Cell/B.E. dW zone, your authoritative Cell/B.E. resource center.

Cell/B.E. Multi-core Architecture Innovation

The Cell/B.E. multi-core architecture incorporates several interesting features which enable Cell to support highly parallel, compute intensive codes. While PlayStation 3 is the first major piece of hardware to use Cell in the gaming industry, the Roadrunner project scheduled to be deployed at Los Alamos National Laboratory will be the first large-scale heterogeneous supercomputer system deployment containing 16,000 Cell processors hybridizing with 16,000 Opteron X64 delivering 1.6 petaflops.

[31st TOP500 List of World's Most Powerful Supercomputers Topped by World's First Petaflop/s System -* "The new No. 1 system, built by IBM for the U.S. Department of Energy's Los Alamos National Laboratory and and named "Roadrunner," by LANL after the state bird of New Mexico achieved performance of 1.026 petaflop/s---becoming the first supercomputer ever to reach this milestone. At the same time, Roadrunner is also one of the most energy efficient systems on the TOP500."

Programming techniques which harness the power of Cell are key to attaining the high compute performance of which it is capable, but such techniques may require some different programming concepts and training.

Cell/B.E. Training

Becoming an expert in multi-core programming and support. Cell/B.E. training teaches you the skills needed to become an expert in Cell/B.E. multi-core program development and deployment. It provides you an in-depth training in programming and programming models, and how to use various development and performance tools to exploit the Cell/B.E. multi-core architecture. The training also teaches you to plan, support, maintain, and integrate a cluster of homogeneous Cell Blade Servers, or a heterogeneous supercomputing system when incorporating with other processing system technologies. Learn more about Cell/B.E. Training program by taking a look at some sample curriculum and course catalog.

Self-paced or in-class training. Learn Cell/B.E. programming at your own pace with the Cell/B.E. Self-Paced Learning, or sign up for a face-2-face classroom training at a Cell/B.E. Training Center. You may also check the current planned training schedule.

Cell/B.E. Professional Certification

After becoming an expert in Cell/BE, you are now a valuable resource to your colleagues, company, and customers. The next logical step is to gain recognition for technical competency from your peers and employers, try to differentiate yourself and your business in a competitive market, and to build credibility with your clients. Show your expertise in Cell/BE programming development by obtaining the Cell/BE Developer Professional certification. Prove your system knowledge through your certified Support Professional. The Cell/BE certification program is also available for Technical Coordinator and System Administrator.