Abstract. This paper presents two dynamic search trees attaining near-optimal performance on any hierarchical memory. The data structures are independent of the parameters of the memory hierarchy, e.g., the number of memory levels, the block-transfer size at each level, and the relative speeds of memory levels. The performance is analyzed in terms of the number of memory transfers between two memory levels with an arbitrary block-transfer size of B; this analysis can then be applied to every adjacent pair of levels in a multilevel memory hierarchy. Both search trees match the optimal search bound of Θ(1+logB+1 N) memory transfers. This bound is also achieved by the classic B-tree data structure on a two-level memory hierarchy with a known block-transfer size B. The first search tree supports insertions and deletions in Θ(1 + logB+1 N) amortized memory transfers, which matches the B-tree’s worst-case bounds. The second search tree supports scanning S consecutive elements optimally in Θ(1 + S/B) memory transfers and supports insertions and deletions in Θ(1 + logB+1 N + log2 N) amortized memory transfers, matching the performance of the B-tree for B = B Ω(log N log log N).

In this paper, we present lower bounds for permuting and sorting in the cache-oblivious model. We prove that (1) I/O optimal cache-oblivious comparison based sorting is not possible without a tall cache assumption, and (2) there does not exist an I/O optimalcache-oblivious algorithm for permuting, not even in the presence of a tall cache assumption.Our results for sorting show the existence of an inherent trade-off in the cache-oblivious model between the strength of the tall cache assumption and the overhead for the case M >> B, and show that Funnelsort and recursive binary mergesort are optimal algorithms in the sense that they attain this trade-off.

Abstract The cache oblivious model of computation is a two-level memory model with the assumption that the parameters of the model are unknown to the algorithms. A consequence of this assumption is that an algorithm efficient in the cache oblivious model is automatically efficient in a multi-level memory model. Arge et al. recently presented the first optimal cache oblivious priority queue, and demonstrated the importance of this result by providing the first cache oblivious algorithms for graph problems. Their structure uses cache oblivious sorting and selection as subroutines. In this paper, we devise an alternative optimal cache oblivious priority queue based only on binary merging. We also show that our structure can be made adaptive to different usage profiles. 1

Abstract. We study the problem of maintaining a dynamic ordered set subject to insertions, deletions, and traversals of k consecutive elements. This problem is trivially solved on a RAM and on a simple two-level memory hierarchy. We explore this traversal problem on more realistic memory models: the cache-oblivious model, which applies to unknown and multi-level memory hierarchies, and sequential-access models, where sequential block transfers are less expensive than random block transfers. 1

B-trees are the data structure of choice for maintaining searchable data on disk. However, B-trees perform suboptimally • when keys are long or of variable length, • when keys are compressed, even when using front compression, the standard B-tree compression scheme, • for range queries, and • with respect to memory effects such as disk prefetching. This paper presents a cache-oblivious string B-tree (COSB-tree) data structure that is efficient in all these ways: • The COSB-tree searches asymptotically optimally and inserts and deletes nearly optimally. • It maintains an index whose size is proportional to the frontcompressed size of the dictionary. Furthermore, unlike standard front-compressed strings, keys can be decompressed in a memory-efficient manner. • It performs range queries with no extra disk seeks; in contrast, B-trees incur disk seeks when skipping from leaf block to leaf block. • It utilizes all levels of a memory hierarchy efficiently and makes good use of disk locality by using cache-oblivious layout strategies.

The cache-oblivious model of computation is a two-level memory model with the assumption that the parameters of the model are unknown to the algorithms. A consequence of this assumption is that an algorithm efficient in the cache oblivious model is automatically efficient in a multi-level memory model. Since the introduction of the cache-oblivious model by Frigo et al. in 1999, a number of algorithms and data structures in the model has been proposed and analyzed. However, less attention has been given to whether the nice theoretical proporities of cache-oblivious algorithms carry over into practice. This paper is an algorithmic engineering study of cache-oblivious sorting. We investigate a number of implementation issues and parameters choices for the cache-oblivious sorting algorithm Lazy Funnelsort by empirical methods, and compare the final algorithm with Quicksort, the established standard for comparison based sorting, as well as with recent cache-aware proposals. The main result is a carefully implemented cache-oblivious sorting algorithm, which we compare to the best implementation of Quicksort we can find, and find that it competes very well for input residing in RAM, and outperforms Quicksort for input on disk. 1

This paper gives tight bounds on the cost of cache-oblivious searching. The paper shows that no cache-oblivious search structure can guarantee a search performance of fewer than lgelog B N memory transfers between any two levels of the memory hierarchy. This lower bound holds even if all of the block sizes are limited to be powers of 2. The paper gives modified versions of the van Emde Boas layout, where the expected number of memory transfers between any two levels of the memory hierarchy is arbitrarily close to [lge+O(lglgB/lgB)]log B N +O(1). This factor approaches lge ≈ 1.443 as B increases. The expectation is taken over the random placement in memory of the first element of the structure. Because searching in the disk-access machine (DAM) model can be performed in log B N+O(1) block transfers, thisresultestablishes aseparation between the (2-level) DAM model and cache-oblivious model. The DAM model naturally extends to k levels. The paper also shows that as k grows, the search costs of the optimal k-level DAM search structure and the optimal cache-oblivious search structure rapidly converge. This result demonstrates that for a multilevel memory hierarchy, a simple cache-oblivious structure almost replicates the performance of an optimal parameterized k-level DAM structure.

1 Introduction The partial-sums problem is to maintain an array A[1..n]subject to the following operations:

Abstract. Frigo, Leiserson, Prokop and Ramachandran in 1999 introduced the ideal-cache model as a formal model of computation for developing algorithms in environments with multiple levels of caching, and coined the terminology of cache-oblivious algorithms. Cache-oblivious algorithms are described as standard RAM algorithms with only one memory level, i.e. without any knowledge about memory hierarchies, but are analyzed in the two-level I/O model of Aggarwal and Vitter for an arbitrary memory and block size and an optimal off-line cache replacement strategy. The result are algorithms that automatically apply to multi-level memory hierarchies. This paper gives an overview of the results achieved on cache-oblivious algorithms and data structures since the seminal paper by Frigo et al. 1

Consider laying out a fixed-topology tree of N nodes into external memory with block size B so as to minimize the worst-case number of block memory transfers required to traverse a path from the root to a node of depth D. We prove that the optimal number of memory transfers is D