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120
Treadmarks: Shared memory computing on networks of workstations
- Computer
, 1996
"... TreadMarks supports parallel computing on networks of workstations by providing the application with a shared memory abstraction. Shared memory facilitates the transition from sequential to parallel programs. After identifying possible sources of parallelism in the code, most of the data structures ..."
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Cited by 487 (37 self)
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TreadMarks supports parallel computing on networks of workstations by providing the application with a shared memory abstraction. Shared memory facilitates the transition from sequential to parallel programs. After identifying possible sources of parallelism in the code, most of the data structures can be retained without change, and only synchronization needs to be added to achieve a correct shared memory parallel program. Additional transformations may be necessary to optimize performance, but this can be done in an incremental fashion. We discuss the techniques used in TreadMarks to provide e cient shared memory, and our experience with two large applications, mixed integer programming and genetic linkage analysis. 1
Designing an Extensible Distributed Language with a Meta-Level Architecture
, 1993
"... This paper presents a methodology for designing extensible languages for distributed computing. ..."
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Cited by 122 (10 self)
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This paper presents a methodology for designing extensible languages for distributed computing.
Techniques for reducing consistency-related communication in distributed shared memory systems
- ACM Transactions on Computer Systems. Toappear
"... Distributed shared memory (DSM) is a software abstraction of shared memory on a distributed memory machine. One of the key problems in building an e cient DSM system is to reduce the amount ofcommunication needed to keep the distributed memories consistent. In this paper we presentfour techniques fo ..."
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Cited by 106 (13 self)
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Distributed shared memory (DSM) is a software abstraction of shared memory on a distributed memory machine. One of the key problems in building an e cient DSM system is to reduce the amount ofcommunication needed to keep the distributed memories consistent. In this paper we presentfour techniques for doing so: (1) software release consistency � (2) multiple consistency protocols � (3) write-shared protocols � and (4) an update-with-timeout mechanism. These techniques have been implemented in the Munin DSM system. We compare the performance of seven application programs on Munin, rst to their performance when implemented using message passing and then to their performance when running on a conventional DSM system that does not embody the above techniques. On a 16-processor cluster of workstations, Munin's performance is within 5 % of message passing for four out of the seven applications. For the other three, performance is within 29 % to 33%. Detailed analysis of two of these three applications indicates that the addition of a function shipping capability would bring their performance within 7 % of the message passing performance. Compared to a conventional DSM system, Munin achieves performance improvements ranging from a few to several hundred percent, depending on the application.
ParaWeb: Towards World-Wide Supercomputing
- In European Symposium on Operating System Principles
, 1996
"... In this paper, we describe the design of a system, called ParaWeb, for utilizing Internet or intra-net computing resources in a seamless fashion. The goal is to allow users to execute serial programs on faster compute servers or parallel programs on a variety of possibly heterogeneous hosts. ParaWeb ..."
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Cited by 86 (5 self)
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In this paper, we describe the design of a system, called ParaWeb, for utilizing Internet or intra-net computing resources in a seamless fashion. The goal is to allow users to execute serial programs on faster compute servers or parallel programs on a variety of possibly heterogeneous hosts. ParaWeb provides extensions to the Java programming environment (through a parallel class library) and the Java runtime system that allow programmers to develop new Java applications with parallelism in mind, or to execute existing Java applications written using Java's multithreading facilities in parallel. Some experimental results from our prototype implementation are used to demonstrate the potential of this approach. 1 Introduction The recent explosion of the World-Wide Web has enabled a diverse set of new Internet related applications and technologies. Among the key attractions of the Web has been the promise of easy access to a wealth of information around the world. Currently, however, the...
Efficient Distributed Shared Memory Based On Multi-Protocol Release Consistency
, 1994
"... A distributed shared memory (DSM) system allows shared memory parallel programs to be executed on distributed memory multiprocessors. The challenge in building a DSM system is to achieve good performance over a wide range of shared memory programs without requiring extensive modifications to the s ..."
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Cited by 68 (5 self)
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A distributed shared memory (DSM) system allows shared memory parallel programs to be executed on distributed memory multiprocessors. The challenge in building a DSM system is to achieve good performance over a wide range of shared memory programs without requiring extensive modifications to the source code. The performance challenge translates into reducing the amount of communication performed by the DSM system to that performed by an equivalent message passing program. This thesis describes four novel techniques for reducing the communication overhead of DSM, including: (i) the use of software release consistency, (ii) support for multiple consistency protocols, (iii) a multiple writer protocol, and (iv) an update timeout mechanism. Release consistency allows modifications of shared data to be handled via a delayed update queue, which masks network latencies. Providing multiple cons...
Design of the Munin Distributed Shared Memory System
"... Software distributed shared memory (DSM) is a software abstraction of shared memory on a distributed memory machine. The key problem in building an e cient DSM system is to reduce the amount of communication needed to keep the distributed memories consistent. The Munin DSM system incorporates a numb ..."
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Cited by 52 (1 self)
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Software distributed shared memory (DSM) is a software abstraction of shared memory on a distributed memory machine. The key problem in building an e cient DSM system is to reduce the amount of communication needed to keep the distributed memories consistent. The Munin DSM system incorporates a number of novel techniques for doing so, including the use of multiple consistency protocols and support for multiple concurrent writer protocols. Due to these, and other, features, Munin is able to achieve high performance on a variety of numerical applications This paper contains a detailed description of the design and implementation of the Munin prototype, with special emphasis given to its novel write shared protocol. Furthermore, it describes a number of lessons that we learned from our experience with the prototype implementation that are relevant to the implementation of future DSMs.
A taxonomy-based comparison of several distributed shared memory systems
- ACM Operating Systems Review
, 1990
"... Two possible modes of Input/Output (I/O)are "sequential " and "random-access", and there is an extremely strong conceptual link between I/O and communication. Sequential communi-cation, typified in the I/O setting by magnetic tape, is typified in the communication ..."
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Cited by 43 (7 self)
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Two possible modes of Input/Output (I/O)are "sequential " and "random-access", and there is an extremely strong conceptual link between I/O and communication. Sequential communi-cation, typified in the I/O setting by magnetic tape, is typified in the communication setting by a stream, e.g., a UNIX 1 pipe. Random-access communication, typified in the I/O setting by a drum or disk device, is typified in the communication setting by shared memory. In this paper, we study and survey the extension of the random-access model to distributed computer systems. A Distributed Shared Memory (DSM) is a memory area shared by processes running on computers connected by a network. DSM provides direct system support of the shared memory programming model. When assisted by hardware, it can also provide a low-overhead interprocess communication (IPC) mechanism to software. Shared pages are migrated on demand between the hosts. Since computer network latency is typically much larger than that of a shared bus, caching in DSM is necessary for performance. We use caching and issues such as address space structure and page replacement schemes to define a taxonomy. Based on the taxonomy we examine three DSM efforts in detail, namely: IVY, Clouds and MemNet.
Cluster-Based File Replication in Large-Scale Distributed Systems
, 1992
"... The increasing need for data sharing in large-scale distributed systems may place a heavy burden on critical resources such as file servers and networks. Our examination of the workload in one large commercial engineering environment shows that wide-spread sharing of unstable files among tens to hun ..."
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Cited by 25 (2 self)
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The increasing need for data sharing in large-scale distributed systems may place a heavy burden on critical resources such as file servers and networks. Our examination of the workload in one large commercial engineering environment shows that wide-spread sharing of unstable files among tens to hundreds of users is common. Traditional clientbased file cacheing techniques are not scalable in such environments. We propose Frolic, a scheme for cluster-based file replication in large-scale distributed file systems. A cluster is a group of workstations and one or more file servers on a local area network. Large distributed systems may have tens or hundreds of clusters connected by a backbone network. By dynamically creating and maintaining replicas of shared files on the file servers in the clusters using those files, we effectively reduce reliance on central servers supporting such files, as well as reduce the distances between the accessing sites and data. We propose and study algorithms...
Virtual Shared Memory: A Survey of Techniques and Systems
, 1992
"... Shared memory abstraction on distributed memory hardware has become very popular recently. The abstraction can be provided at various levels in the architecture e.g. hardware, software, employing special mechanisms to maintain coherence of data. In this paper we present a survey of basic techniques ..."
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Cited by 19 (1 self)
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Shared memory abstraction on distributed memory hardware has become very popular recently. The abstraction can be provided at various levels in the architecture e.g. hardware, software, employing special mechanisms to maintain coherence of data. In this paper we present a survey of basic techniques and review a large number of architectures that provide such an abstraction. We also propose new terminology which is more consistent and orderly as compared with the existing use of terminology for such architectures. 1 Introduction Virtual Shared Memory (VSM) in its most general sense refers to a provision of a shared address space on distributed memory hardware. Such architectures contain no physically shared memory. Instead the distributed local memories collectively provide a virtual address space shared by all the processors. VSM combines the benefits of the ease of programming found in shared-memory multiprocessors with the scalability of message-passing multiprocessors. The implemen...
A Survey of Multiprocessor Operating System Kernels
, 1993
"... Multiprocessors have been accepted as vehicles for improved computing speeds, cost/performance, and enhanced reliability or availability. However, the added performance requirements of user programs and functional capabilities of parallel hardware introduce new challenges to operating system design ..."
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Cited by 14 (3 self)
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Multiprocessors have been accepted as vehicles for improved computing speeds, cost/performance, and enhanced reliability or availability. However, the added performance requirements of user programs and functional capabilities of parallel hardware introduce new challenges to operating system design and implementation. This paper reviews research and commercial developments in multiprocessor operating system kernels from the late 1970's to the early 1990's. The paper first discusses some common operating system structuring techniques and examines the advantages and disadvantages of using each technique. It then identifies some of the major design goals and key issues in multiprocessor operating systems. Issues and solution approaches are illustrated by review of a variety of research or commercial multiprocessor operating system kernels. College of Computing Georgia Institute of Technology Atlanta, Georgia 30332--0280 Contents 1 Introduction 1 2 Structuring an Operating System 4 2....
