Modern software development methods combined with key generalizations of standard computational algorithms enable the development of a new class of electromagnetic modeling tools. This paper describes current and anticipated capabilities of a frequency domain modeling code, EIGER, which has an extremely wide range of applicability. In addition, software implementation methods and high performance computing issues are discussed.

Construction of the National Ignition Facility laser at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory features a large distributed control system constructed using object-oriented software engineering techniques. Control of 60,000 devices is effected using a network of some 500 computers that run software written in Ada and communicating through CORBA. The project has completed its final design review; implementation of the first of five planned increments will be delivered at the end of fiscal year 1998. Preliminary measures of the distributed controls performance confirm the design decisions reported in this paper, and the measurement and supporting simulation of full system performance continue.