Vladimir Vorobyov: “Mikhail Botvinnik was happy that the machine did not find the solution that he found at the board”



    When a scientific research computer center was created in Leningrad (now SPIIRAS: St. Petersburg Institute of Informatics and Automation of the Russian Academy of Sciences), Vladimir Vorobyev joined the computer software group. In 1978, a laboratory of the same name was formed on its base, and Vladimir Ivanovich led it for 30 years.

    Vorobyov - Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Professor. Now he occupies the position of chief research fellow, and his place of work is called the Laboratory of Information and Computing Systems and Programming Technologies.

    We continue to complement the museum's DataArt collection of IT history interviews. Earlier Sergey Zonov , Evgeny Kanevsky and Alexander Lamden became our interlocutors.

    About weather


    - When did you realize that computer technology is yours?

    - Another student. In 1963, I graduated from the Hydrometeorological Institute, we had an experimental group of programmers to calculate the weather forecast. I wrote my thesis in the Novosibirsk Computing Center, which was headed by the last president of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Guri Ivanovich Marchuk. In his group, I developed a model of the atmospheric boundary layer.


    The Institute of Computational Mathematics and Mathematical Geophysics (IVMiMG) was founded in 1964 as the Computing Center of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences

    - Why Border?

    - The biggest problems here are turbulent flows, which are very difficult to describe. When I got involved in this work, the errors in the forecasts of the boundary layer were the largest - about 200 percent. Because the interaction with the underlying surface was not taken into account, and it is very heterogeneous: water, forests, arable land ... This significantly affects the weather.

    - The program you wrote helped reduce the percentage of errors?

    - We brought it to reasonable numbers, about 70-60 percent. Now forecast accuracy (not error, but justification) is 80-90 percent. It all depends on what we predict. If the temperature, then it is very variable in space and time, you need to choose representative points for measurements.

    - How was the weather forecast compiled in the 1960s?

    - Forecasters manually processed forecast maps. Now the computer is doing it. Without computer technology, it is impossible to master the gigantic amount of information received from satellites and through observations. This is a serious job. There is a huge network of stations in the world - there are thousands of them. Part is automatic. Data from them and from satellites flock to regional centers, and then transmitted to the world meteorological organization. Information is accumulated in world weather centers. One of them is located in Obninsk.

    Further, the data goes to regional organizations for operational work. Synoptic maps are compiled there, where all weather information is marked in a special code. Using this map and the weather forecast map that the computer calculates, the weather forecaster makes a decision and finally formulates the forecast - for a maximum of three days.

    - That is, long-term forecasts are unreliable?

    - This is a theoretically proven fact. The atmosphere and the ocean are interconnected, weather cannot be considered without them. The system is non-linear, after three days we lose data on the initial state.

    CYBER 170


    - How did you end up in Leningrad after Novosibirsk?

    - After defending my diploma, I entered graduate school, which at that time was not easy to do. It was necessary to work out, but I managed to convince the management. At the same time, I continued to work in Novosibirsk - I flew there on business trips. Having defended my dissertation in 1969, I became an employee of the Institute of Oceanology of the Academy of Sciences. There he was engaged in the same plus a number of other tasks. Since flights to space have already begun, I calculated the radiation on Mars, the solar climates of the planets of the solar system.

    - What is the practical significance of these studies?
    - The weather on Earth is completely dependent on the energy that comes to us from the Sun. When we compare different planets, we better understand the physical processes taking place with us. In addition, the institute was engaged in the general circulation of the atmosphere of the ocean. This was one of the main topics.


    Central racks BESM-6. To the left are the buffer registers and the communication device, then the control unit (control device), then - the control unit (arithmetic device). On the right is the edge of the UVU (control of external devices).

    - Why did you move to the Computing Center in 1975?

    - There were problems in relations with the management, in addition, I was offered a promotion. If I worked there as a junior research fellow (even doctors of science in this position were seated), here - immediately as a senior. Career.


    Machine room: tape drives in the foreground (yellow) teletype

    - What was now your job?

    - In part, I was engaged in modeling, but the main task was the mathematical support of computers. The main workhorse then was BESM-6. It has completed most of the scientific research in the USSR. We had two such machines. In 1978, they bought the American CYBER 170 from CDC. Very expensive - about 5 million gold was paid for it. This is more than 5 million dollars. In total, there were 6-7 such machines in the USSR.


    Magnetic drums of external memory. The weight of the drum is about 300 kg, the memory capacity is 32 kiloslov of BESM-6.

    It was supplied with the software of the manufacturer - Control Data Corporation. It was an order of magnitude better than for BESM-6. Nothing more, everything is very balanced, with powerful libraries of scientific programs that make it easier to solve many scientific problems.


    The machine room of the Computing Center of the Academy of Sciences on the Mendeleev line in Leningrad. Photo source

    - What else was the American car superior to domestic?

    - The speed, efficiency and convenience of the service. For example, she had a ready-made algorithm for solving differential equations. We only supplied the initial data and integrated the equation. At BESM-6, this had to be programmed manually.
    In some industries — geophysics, nuclear reactor design — high performance was required from computer technology. At CYBER 170 it was higher. On Sakhalin, such machines stood for the study of mineral resources.


    CYBER 170 at the Computing Center. Photograph of the late 1980s. Photo source

    - What problems did you encounter in the operation of machines?

    - When you start solving a problem, in 90 percent of cases it does not go. Very rarely, programmers prepare an algorithm that fits right away. We helped them find mistakes. More often than not, a machine does not understand a programming language when its rules are violated. There are software errors, sometimes the equipment fails, for example, when the temperature rises. The car had three cooling cycles: air, freon and water. There was a cooling tower in the courtyard. Have you seen these at power plants, where does the steam come from? She was with us too, only more modest. So, at the entrance, the temperature should be 17 degrees. Sometimes during heat or poor operation of the equipment, it increased, and the machine crashed.

    Starovoitova, Botvinnik and astronauts


    - How many computer centers were in the USSR in those years?

    - The first is in Moscow. This is the Dorodnitsyn Institute (Computing Center named after A. A. Dorodnitsyn of the Russian Academy of Sciences - Approx. Ed.). There was a center in Novosibirsk - Guri Ivanovich Marchuk was invited there. Their computer centers were created in serious institutions. For example, the Institute of Applied Mathematics of the Academy of Sciences, where spacecraft trajectories were calculated. The Hydrometeorological Center had a computing center.
    Since cars are expensive, and highly qualified specialists are needed for maintenance, not every institution could afford them. Therefore, they began to create centers for collective use. Now, by the way, we are also observing a collective use system, but in a new round of development, these are cloud computing.


    Cyber ​​170 machine room. The operator works at the terminal.

    - How many specialists worked in your computer center?

    - About ten electronic engineers, about the same number of software specialists. Plus refrigerators, electricians ... This is for the entire fleet of machines that the Leningrad institutions of the Academy of Sciences could use.

    - With what tasks did they come to you?

    - We found out the needs of institutions. The Institute of Oceanology has been modeling the ocean, atmosphere, and climate. Institute of Physics and Technology - solid state physics. He had his own cars, but we were interested in libraries of scientific programs. By the way, not all tasks could be considered on CYBER 170, because the Americans controlled our calculations. And in those days there were also sanctions. We were delivered a car with a capacity of no more than that of BESM-6. But we removed jumpers that slow down performance.

    - There were times when someone tried to get into you without waiting in line?

    - Yes. For example, Galina Starovoitova. She came to me and urgently demanded to count her task. She said: "The director allowed me." Galina Vasilievna then worked in the Kunstkamera and was engaged in some kind of sociological research. To solve her problem, an algorithmist was needed to translate all this into the language of mathematics, and then find a numerical algorithm that would fall on the architecture of a particular computer. The task was impossible.

    - Had to refuse?

    - Yes, although it was not easy. Galina Vasilyevna demanded persistently and energetically. But we were ready to provide only advice on solving the problem.


    Cyber ​​170 Audio Cases

    - Bribes suggested that you count out of turn?

    - Once I noticed that a group serving user services has cakes - they are standing outside the window. It turned out that people push their tasks because machine time was a big shortage. I had to stop and send my deputy to work in this group. For such an unscientific task, he was even offended by me.

    In general, maintaining order in the center was not easy. From subscriber stations work was carried out at night. I had to do computer security. Some users, especially physicists, could infiltrate where they shouldn't have - into the area of ​​a system programmer, or into the resource of another user.

    “Did any of the greats come to your center?”

    - For example, the sixth world chess champion Mikhail Botvinnik. We had a chess program, at that time quite serious. Mikhail Moiseevich uploaded his game with Capablanca and was very happy that the machine could not find the solution that he had found at the blackboard.


    The game against Capablanca at the 1938 AVRO Tournament is the most famous in the career of Mikhail Botvinnik. After the 29th move, Garry Kasparov called the “most famous in the history of chess”

    . Astronauts came to us on an excursion. The relationship with them was pretty close, because our two first directors, Valentin Mikhailovich Ponomarev and Rafael Midhatovich Yusupov, came from the Mozhaisk Academy, which trains specialists for the space forces. In addition, our employees are still doing calculations for the space industry.

    - What are you most proud of in your work?

    - Creation of computer networks. This was our key task, we began to deal with it since 1985. Now everyone uses network services, the Internet is commonplace, and at that time we conducted experiments. This is a pretty serious job. What is network connectivity? Here we are conducting a dialogue, there is a certain protocol of the interview. You ask a question, I answer. Computers also have a dialogue on the protocol. The first sends a request, the second confirms: “Yes, I am ready to receive!” After that, a packet is formed in which there is an address - where it goes and to whom.

    - Who used computer networks in those years?

    - The same meteorologists, for example. They had networks between weak machines that collected data from stations, accumulated them, and transferred them to large computers. The launch of spacecraft also could not do without computer networks.

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