Facilitating Collaboration in Machine Learning and High-Performance Computing Projects with an Interaction Room

Abstract

The design, development, and deployment of scientific computing applications can be quite complex, in particular when involving Machine Learning (ML) or High-Performance Computing (HPC). They require scientific and software engineering expertise and in addition HPC or ML knowledge. Often, such applications are however developed by scientists who are experts in their domain, but need support for the software engineering, ML, and HPC aspects. The cooperation and communication between experts from these quite different disciplines can be difficult though. We therefore propose to employ the Interaction Room (IR), a method that facilitates interdisciplinary collaboration in complex software projects. An IR uses annotated drawings to exchange information and stimulate discussion between project stakeholders, in order to improve common understanding and identify uncertainties, risks, and other aspects that are critical to a project's success early on. We suggest different drawing canvases and annotations that focus on different viewpoints and issues of the project. These canvases are specific to the project type, such as ML applications or HPC simulations.