Introduction to Parallel Computing

Abstract

This tutorial covers the very basics of parallel computing, and is intended for someone who is
just becoming acquainted with the subject. It begins with a brief overview, including concepts
and terminology associated with parallel computing. The topics of parallel memory architectures
and programming models are then explored.

Overview

What is Parallel Computing?

• Traditionally, software has been written for serial computation:
o To be run on a single computer having a single Central Processing Unit (CPU);
o A problem is broken into a discrete series of instructions.
o Instructions are executed one after another.
o Only one instruction may execute at any moment in time.

• In the simplest sense, parallel computing is the simultaneous use of multiple compute
resources to solve a computational problem:
o To be run using multiple CPUs
o A problem is broken into discrete parts that can be solved concurrently
o Each part is further broken down to a series of instructions
o Instructions from each part execute simultaneously on different CPUs
 • The compute resources can include:
o A single computer with multiple processors;
o An arbitrary number of computers connected by a network;
o A combination of both.
• The computational problem usually demonstrates characteristics such as the ability to be:
o Broken apart into discrete pieces of work that can be solved simultaneously;
o Execute multiple program instructions at any moment in time;
o Solved in less time with multiple compute resources than with a single compute
resource.

The Universe is Parallel:

• Parallel computing is an evolution of serial computing that attempts to emulate what has
always been the state of affairs in the natural world: many complex, interrelated events
happening at the same time, yet within a sequence. For example:
o Galaxy formation o Rush hour traffic
o Planetary movement o Automobile assembly line
o Weather and ocean o Building a space shuttle
patterns
o Ordering a hamburger at the drive
o Tectonic plate drift through.
The Real World is Massively Parallel
Uses for Parallel Computing:

• Historically, parallel computing has been considered to be "the high end of computing",
and has been used to model difficult scientific and engineering problems found in the real
world. Some examples:
o Atmosphere, Earth, Environment
o Physics - applied, nuclear, particle, condensed matter, high pressure, fusion,
photonics
o Bioscience, Biotechnology, Genetics
o Chemistry, Molecular Sciences
o Geology, Seismology
o Mechanical Engineering - from prosthetics to spacecraft
o Electrical Engineering, Circuit Design, Microelectronics
o Computer Science, Mathematics
• Today, commercial applications provide an equal or greater driving force in the
development of faster computers. These applications require the processing of large
amounts of data in sophisticated ways. For example:
o Databases, data mining
o Oil exploration
o Web search engines, web based business services
o Medical imaging and diagnosis
o Pharmaceutical design
o Management of national and multi-national corporations
o Financial and economic modeling
o Advanced graphics and virtual reality, particularly in the entertainment industry
o Networked video and multi-media technologies
o Collaborative work environments
Overview

Why Use Parallel Computing?

Main Reasons:

• Save time and/or money: In theory, throwing more resources at a task will shorten its
time to completion, with potential cost savings. Parallel clusters can be built from cheap,
commodity components.

• Solve larger problems: Many problems are so large and/or complex that it is impractical
or impossible to solve them on a single computer, especially given limited computer
memory. For example:
o "Grand Challenge" (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Challenge) problems requiring
PetaFLOPS and PetaBytes of computing resources.
o Web search engines/databases processing millions of transactions per second

• Provide concurrency: A single compute resource can only do one thing at a time.
Multiple computing resources can be doing many things simultaneously. For example,
the Access Grid (www.accessgrid.org) provides a global collaboration network where
people from around the world can meet and conduct work "virtually".
 • Use of non-local resources: Using compute resources on a wide area network, or even
the Internet when local compute resources are scarce. For example:
o SETI@home (setiathome.berkeley.edu) uses over 330,000 computers for a
compute power over 528 TeraFLOPS (as of August 04, 2008)
o Folding@home (folding.stanford.edu) uses over 340,000 computers for a compute
power of 4.2 PetaFLOPS (as of November 4, 2008)

• Limits to serial computing: Both physical and practical reasons pose significant
constraints to simply building ever faster serial computers:
o Transmission speeds - the speed of a serial computer is directly dependent upon
how fast data can move through hardware. Absolute limits are the speed of light
(30 cm/nanosecond) and the transmission limit of copper wire (9 cm/nanosecond).
Increasing speeds necessitate increasing proximity of processing elements.
o Limits to miniaturization - processor technology is allowing an increasing number
of transistors to be placed on a chip. However, even with molecular or atomic-
level components, a limit will be reached on how small components can be.
o Economic limitations - it is increasingly expensive to make a single processor
faster. Using a larger number of moderately fast commodity processors to achieve
the same (or better) performance is less expensive.

Current computer architectures are increasingly relying upon hardware level parallelism
to improve performance:

o Multiple execution units

o Pipelined instructions
o Multi-core

Who and What?

 • Top500.org provides statistics on parallel computing users - the charts below are just a
sample. Some things to note:
o Sectors may overlap - for example, research may be classified research.
Respondents have to choose between the two.
o "Not Specified" is by far the largest application - probably means multiple
applications.

The Future:

• During the past 20 years, the trends indicated by ever faster networks, distributed
systems, and multi-processor computer architectures (even at the desktop level) clearly
show that parallelism is the future of computing.
Concepts and Terminology

von Neumann Architecture

• Named after the Hungarian mathematician John von Neumann who first authored the
general requirements for an electronic computer in his 1945 papers.
• Since then, virtually all computers have followed this basic design, which differed from
earlier computers programmed through "hard wiring".
o Comprised of four main
components:
 Memory
 Control Unit
 Arithmetic Logic Unit
 Input/Output
o Read/write, random access
memory is used to store both
program instructions and data
 Program instructions
are coded data which tell the
computer to do something
 Data is simply
information to be used by the
program
o Control unit fetches
instructions/data from memory,
decodes the instructions and then
sequentially coordinates operations
to accomplish the programmed task.
o Aritmetic Unit performs basic
arithmetic operations

o Input/Output is the interface

to the human operator

Concepts and Terminology

Flynn's Classical Taxonomy

• There are different ways to classify parallel computers. One of the more widely used
classifications, in use since 1966, is called Flynn's Taxonomy.
 • Flynn's taxonomy distinguishes multi-processor computer architectures according to how
they can be classified along the two independent dimensions of Instruction and Data.
Each of these dimensions can have only one of two possible states: Single or Multiple.
• The matrix below defines the 4 possible classifications according to Flynn:

SISD SIMD

Single Instruction, Single Data Single Instruction, Multiple Data

MISD MIMD

Multiple Instruction, Single Data Multiple Instruction, Multiple Data

Single Instruction, Single Data (SISD):

• A serial (non-parallel) computer

• Single instruction: only one instruction stream is being
acted on by the CPU during any one clock cycle
• Single data: only one data stream is being used as input
during any one clock cycle
• Deterministic execution
• This is the oldest and even today, the most common type of
computer

• Examples: older generation mainframes, minicomputers and

workstations; most modern day PCs.
UNIVAC1 IBM 360 CRAY1

CDC 7600 PDP1 Dell Laptop

 Single Instruction, Multiple
Data (SIMD):

• A type of parallel
computer
• Single instruction: All
processing units execute
the same instruction at
any given clock cycle
• Multiple data: Each
processing unit can
operate on a different
data element
• Best suited for
specialized problems
characterized by a high
degree of regularity, such
as graphics/image
processing.
• Synchronous (lockstep)
and deterministic
execution
• Two varieties: Processor
Arrays and Vector
Pipelines
• Examples:
o Processor Arrays:
Connection
Machine CM-2,
MasPar MP-1 &
MP-2, ILLIAC IV
o Vector Pipelines:
IBM 9000, Cray
X-MP, Y-MP &
C90, Fujitsu VP,
NEC SX-2,
 Hitachi S820,
ETA10

• Most modern computers,

particularly those with
graphics processor units
(GPUs) employ SIMD
instructions and
execution units.
ILLIAC IV MasPar

Cray X-MP Cray Y-MP Thinking Machines CM-2 Cell Processor

(GPU)

Multiple Instruction,
Single Data (MISD):

• A single data stream

is fed into multiple
processing units.
• Each processing unit
operates on the data
independently via
independent
instruction streams.
• Few actual examples
of this class of
 parallel computer
have ever existed.
One is the
experimental
Carnegie-Mellon
C.mmp computer
(1971).
• Some conceivable
uses might be:
o multiple
frequency
filters
operating on
a single
signal stream

o multiple
cryptography
algorithms
attempting to
crack a single
coded
message.
Multiple Instruction,
Multiple Data (MIMD):

• Currently, the most

common type of
parallel computer.
Most modern
computers fall into
this category.
• Multiple Instruction:
every processor may
be executing a
different instruction
stream
• Multiple Data: every
processor may be
working with a
different data stream
• Execution can be
synchronous or
asynchronous,
deterministic or non-
deterministic
• Examples: most
current
supercomputers,
networked parallel
computer clusters
and "grids", multi-
processor SMP
computers, multi-
core PCs.

• Note: many MIMD

architectures also
include SIMD
execution sub-
components
IBM POWER5 HP/Compaq Alphaserver Intel IA32

AMD Opteron Cray XT3 IBM BG/L

Concepts and Terminology

Some General Parallel Terminology

Like everything else, parallel computing has its own "jargon". Some of the more commonly used
terms associated with parallel computing are listed below. Most of these will be discussed in
more detail later.
Task
A logically discrete section of computational work. A task is typically a program or
program-like set of instructions that is executed by a processor.
Parallel Task
A task that can be executed by multiple processors safely (yields correct results)
Serial Execution
Execution of a program sequentially, one statement at a time. In the simplest sense, this is
what happens on a one processor machine. However, virtually all parallel tasks will have
sections of a parallel program that must be executed serially.
Parallel Execution
Execution of a program by more than one task, with each task being able to execute the
same or different statement at the same moment in time.
Pipelining
Breaking a task into steps performed by different processor units, with inputs streaming
through, much like an assembly line; a type of parallel computing.
Shared Memory
From a strictly hardware point of view, describes a computer architecture where all
processors have direct (usually bus based) access to common physical memory. In a
programming sense, it describes a model where parallel tasks all have the same "picture"
of memory and can directly address and access the same logical memory locations
regardless of where the physical memory actually exists.
Symmetric Multi-Processor (SMP)
Hardware architecture where multiple processors share a single address space and access
to all resources; shared memory computing.
Distributed Memory
In hardware, refers to network based memory access for physical memory that is not
common. As a programming model, tasks can only logically "see" local machine memory
and must use communications to access memory on other machines where other tasks are
executing.
Communications
Parallel tasks typically need to exchange data. There are several ways this can be
accomplished, such as through a shared memory bus or over a network, however the
actual event of data exchange is commonly referred to as communications regardless of
the method employed.
Synchronization
 The coordination of parallel tasks in real time, very often associated with
communications. Often implemented by establishing a synchronization point within an
application where a task may not proceed further until another task(s) reaches the same or
logically equivalent point.

Synchronization usually involves waiting by at least one task, and can therefore cause a
parallel application's wall clock execution time to increase.

Granularity
In parallel computing, granularity is a qualitative measure of the ratio of computation to
communication.

• Coarse: relatively large amounts of computational work are done between

communication events
• Fine: relatively small amounts of computational work are done between
communication events

Observed Speedup
Observed speedup of a code which has been parallelized, defined as:

wall-clock time of serial execution

-----------------------------------
wall-clock time of parallel execution

One of the simplest and most widely used indicators for a parallel program's
performance.

Parallel Overhead
The amount of time required to coordinate parallel tasks, as opposed to doing useful
work. Parallel overhead can include factors such as:

• Task start-up time

• Synchronizations
• Data communications
• Software overhead imposed by parallel compilers, libraries, tools,
operating system, etc.
• Task termination time

Massively Parallel
Refers to the hardware that comprises a given parallel system - having many processors.
The meaning of "many" keeps increasing, but currently, the largest parallel computers
can be comprised of processors numbering in the hundreds of thousands.
Embarrassingly Parallel
Solving many similar, but independent tasks simultaneously; little to no need for
coordination between the tasks.
Scalability
Refers to a parallel system's (hardware and/or software) ability to demonstrate a
proportionate increase in parallel speedup with the addition of more processors. Factors
that contribute to scalability include:

• Hardware - particularly memory-cpu bandwidths and network

communications
• Application algorithm
• Parallel overhead related
• Characteristics of your specific application and coding

Multi-core Processors
Multiple processors (cores) on a single chip.
Cluster Computing
Use of a combination of commodity units (processors, networks or SMPs) to build a
parallel system.
Supercomputing / High Performance Computing
Use of the world's fastest, largest machines to solve large problems.

Parallel Computer Memory Architectures

Shared Memory
General Characteristics:
• Shared
memory
parallel
computers
vary widely,
but generally
have in
common the
ability for all
processors to
access all
memory as
global address
space.
• Multiple
processors can
Shared Memory (UMA)
operate
independently
but share the
 same memory
resources.
• Changes in a
memory
location
effected by
one processor
are visible to
all other
processors.
• Shared
memory Shared Memory (NUMA)
machines can
be divided
into two main
classes based
upon memory
access times:
UMA and
NUMA.

Uniform Memory
Access (UMA):

• Most
commonly
represented
today by
Symmetric
Multiprocesso
r (SMP)
machines
• Identical
processors
• Equal access
and access
times to
memory
• Sometimes
called CC-
UMA - Cache
Coherent
UMA. Cache
coherent
means if one
processor
 updates a
location in
shared
memory, all
the other
processors
know about
the update.
Cache
coherency is
accomplished
at the
hardware
level.

Non-Uniform
Memory Access
(NUMA):

• Often made by
physically
linking two or
more SMPs
• One SMP can
directly access
memory of
another SMP
• Not all
processors
have equal
access time to
all memories
• Memory
access across
link is slower

• If cache
coherency is
maintained,
then may also
be called CC-
NUMA -
Cache
Coherent
NUMA
Advantages:
 • Global address space provides a user-friendly programming perspective to memory
• Data sharing between tasks is both fast and uniform due to the proximity of memory to
CPUs

Disadvantages:

• Primary disadvantage is the lack of scalability between memory and CPUs. Adding more
CPUs can geometrically increases traffic on the shared memory-CPU path, and for cache
coherent systems, geometrically increase traffic associated with cache/memory
management.
• Programmer responsibility for synchronization constructs that insure "correct" access of
global memory.
• Expense: it becomes increasingly difficult and expensive to design and produce shared
memory machines with ever increasing numbers of processors.

Parallel Computer Memory Architectures

Distributed Memory
General Characteristics:

• Like shared memory systems, distributed memory systems vary widely but share a
common characteristic. Distributed memory systems require a communication network to
connect inter-processor memory.

• Processors have their own local memory. Memory addresses in one processor do not map
to another processor, so there is no concept of global address space across all processors.
• Because each processor has its own local memory, it operates independently. Changes it
makes to its local memory have no effect on the memory of other processors. Hence, the
concept of cache coherency does not apply.
 • When a processor needs access to data in another processor, it is usually the task of the
programmer to explicitly define how and when data is communicated. Synchronization
between tasks is likewise the programmer's responsibility.
• The network "fabric" used for data transfer varies widely, though it can can be as simple
as Ethernet.

Advantages:

• Memory is scalable with number of processors. Increase the number of processors and
the size of memory increases proportionately.
• Each processor can rapidly access its own memory without interference and without the
overhead incurred with trying to maintain cache coherency.
• Cost effectiveness: can use commodity, off-the-shelf processors and networking.

Disadvantages:

• The programmer is responsible for many of the details associated with data
communication between processors.
• It may be difficult to map existing data structures, based on global memory, to this
memory organization.
• Non-uniform memory access (NUMA) times

Parallel Computer Memory Architectures

Hybrid Distributed-Shared Memory

• The largest and fastest computers in the world today employ both shared and distributed
memory architectures.

• The shared memory component is usually a cache coherent SMP machine. Processors on
a given SMP can address that machine's memory as global.
 • The distributed memory component is the networking of multiple SMPs. SMPs know
only about their own memory - not the memory on another SMP. Therefore, network
communications are required to move data from one SMP to another.
• Current trends seem to indicate that this type of memory architecture will continue to
prevail and increase at the high end of computing for the foreseeable future.
• Advantages and Disadvantages: whatever is common to both shared and distributed
memory architectures.

Parallel Programming Models

Overview
• There are several parallel programming models in common use:
o Shared Memory
o Threads
o Message Passing
o Data Parallel
o Hybrid
• Parallel programming models exist as an abstraction above hardware and memory
architectures.
• Although it might not seem apparent, these models are NOT specific to a particular type
of machine or memory architecture. In fact, any of these models can (theoretically) be
implemented on any underlying hardware. Two examples:

1. Shared memory model on a distributed memory machine: Kendall Square Research

(KSR) ALLCACHE approach.

Machine memory was physically distributed, but appeared to the user as a single
shared memory (global address space). Generically, this approach is referred to as
"virtual shared memory". Note: although KSR is no longer in business, there is no
reason to suggest that a similar implementation will not be made available by
another vendor in the future.

2. Message passing model on a shared memory machine: MPI on SGI Origin.

The SGI Origin employed the CC-NUMA type of shared memory architecture,
where every task has direct access to global memory. However, the ability to send
and receive messages with MPI, as is commonly done over a network of
distributed memory machines, is not only implemented but is very commonly
used.
2 Which model to use is often a combination of what is available and personal choice.
There is no "best" model, although there certainly are better implementations of some models
over others.
3 The following sections describe each of the models mentioned above, and also discuss
some of their actual implementations.

Parallel Programming Models

Shared Memory Model

• In the shared-memory programming model, tasks share a common address space, which
they read and write asynchronously.
• Various mechanisms such as locks / semaphores may be used to control access to the
shared memory.
• An advantage of this model from the programmer's point of view is that the notion of
data "ownership" is lacking, so there is no need to specify explicitly the communication
of data between tasks. Program development can often be simplified.
• An important disadvantage in terms of performance is that it becomes more difficult to
understand and manage data locality.
o Keeping data local to the processor that works on it conserves memory accesses,
cache refreshes and bus traffic that occurs when multiple processors use the same
data.
o Unfortunately, controlling data locality is hard to understand and beyond the
control of the average user.

Implementations:

• On shared memory platforms, the native compilers translate user program variables into
actual memory addresses, which are global.
• No common distributed memory platform implementations currently exist. However, as
mentioned previously in the Overview section, the KSR ALLCACHE approach provided
a shared memory view of data even though the physical memory of the machine was
distributed.

Parallel Programming Models

Threads Model
• In the threads model of parallel programming, a single process can have multiple,
concurrent execution paths.
 • Perhaps the most simple analogy
that can be used to describe
threads is the concept of a single
program that includes a number
of subroutines:
o The main program a.out
is scheduled to run by the
native operating system.
a.out loads and acquires
all of the necessary
system and user resources
to run.
o a.out performs some
serial work, and then
creates a number of tasks
(threads) that can be scheduled and run by the operating system concurrently.
o Each thread has local data, but also, shares the entire resources of a.out. This
saves the overhead associated with replicating a program's resources for each
thread. Each thread also benefits from a global memory view because it shares the
memory space of a.out.
o A thread's work may best be described as a subroutine within the main program.
Any thread can execute any subroutine at the same time as other threads.
o Threads communicate with each other through global memory (updating address
locations). This requires synchronization constructs to insure that more than one
thread is not updating the same global address at any time.
o Threads can come and go, but a.out remains present to provide the necessary
shared resources until the application has completed.
• Threads are commonly associated with shared memory architectures and operating
systems.

Implementations:

• From a programming perspective, threads implementations commonly comprise:

o A library of subroutines that are called from within parallel source code
o A set of compiler directives imbedded in either serial or parallel source code

In both cases, the programmer is responsible for determining all parallelism.

• Threaded implementations are not new in computing. Historically, hardware vendors

have implemented their own proprietary versions of threads. These implementations
differed substantially from each other making it difficult for programmers to develop
portable threaded applications.
• Unrelated standardization efforts have resulted in two very different implementations of
threads: POSIX Threads and OpenMP.
• POSIX Threads
o Library based; requires parallel coding
 o Specified by the IEEE POSIX 1003.1c standard (1995).
o C Language only
o Commonly referred to as Pthreads.
o Most hardware vendors now offer Pthreads in addition to their proprietary threads
implementations.
o Very explicit parallelism; requires significant programmer attention to detail.
• OpenMP
o Compiler directive based; can use serial code
o Jointly defined and endorsed by a group of major computer hardware and
software vendors. The OpenMP Fortran API was released October 28, 1997. The
C/C++ API was released in late 1998.
o Portable / multi-platform, including Unix and Windows NT platforms
o Available in C/C++ and Fortran implementations
o Can be very easy and simple to use - provides for "incremental parallelism"
• Microsoft has its own implementation for threads, which is not related to the UNIX
POSIX standard or OpenMP.

More Information:

• POSIX Threads tutorial: computing.llnl.gov/tutorials/pthreads

• OpenMP tutorial: computing.llnl.gov/tutorials/openMP

Parallel Programming Models

Message Passing Model

• The message
passing model
demonstrates the
following
characteristics:
o A set of
tasks that
use their
own local
memory
during
 computation. Multiple tasks can reside on the same physical machine as well
across an arbitrary number of machines.
o Tasks exchange data through communications by sending and receiving
messages.
o Data transfer usually requires cooperative operations to be performed by each
process. For example, a send operation must have a matching receive operation.

Implementations:

• From a programming perspective, message passing implementations commonly comprise

a library of subroutines that are imbedded in source code. The programmer is responsible
for determining all parallelism.
• Historically, a variety of message passing libraries have been available since the 1980s.
These implementations differed substantially from each other making it difficult for
programmers to develop portable applications.
• In 1992, the MPI Forum was formed with the primary goal of establishing a standard
interface for message passing implementations.
• Part 1 of the Message Passing Interface (MPI) was released in 1994. Part 2 (MPI-2)
was released in 1996. Both MPI specifications are available on the web at http://www-
unix.mcs.anl.gov/mpi/.
• MPI is now the "de facto" industry standard for message passing, replacing virtually all
other message passing implementations used for production work. Most, if not all of the
popular parallel computing platforms offer at least one implementation of MPI. A few
offer a full implementation of MPI-2.
• For shared memory architectures, MPI implementations usually don't use a network for
task communications. Instead, they use shared memory (memory copies) for performance
reasons.

More Information:

• MPI tutorial: computing.llnl.gov/tutorials/mpi

Parallel Programming Models

Data Parallel
Model
• The data parallel model
demonstrates the
following
characteristics:
 o Most of the parallel work focuses on performing operations on a data set. The
data set is typically organized into a common structure, such as an array or cube.
o A set of tasks work collectively on the same data structure, however, each task
works on a different partition of the same data structure.
o Tasks perform the same operation on their partition of work, for example, "add 4
to every array element".
• On shared memory architectures, all tasks may have access to the data structure through
global memory. On distributed memory architectures the data structure is split up and
resides as "chunks" in the local memory of each task.

Implementations:

• Programming with the data parallel model is usually accomplished by writing a program
with data parallel constructs. The constructs can be calls to a data parallel subroutine
library or, compiler directives recognized by a data parallel compiler.
• Fortran 90 and 95 (F90, F95): ISO/ANSI standard extensions to Fortran 77.
o Contains everything that is in Fortran 77
o New source code format; additions to character set
o Additions to program structure and commands
o Variable additions - methods and arguments
o Pointers and dynamic memory allocation added
o Array processing (arrays treated as objects) added
o Recursive and new intrinsic functions added
o Many other new features

Implementations are available for most common parallel platforms.

• High Performance Fortran (HPF): Extensions to Fortran 90 to support data parallel

programming.
o Contains everything in Fortran 90
o Directives to tell compiler how to distribute data added
o Assertions that can improve optimization of generated code added
o Data parallel constructs added (now part of Fortran 95)

Implementations are available for most common parallel platforms.

• Compiler Directives: Allow the programmer to specify the distribution and alignment of
data. Fortran implementations are available for most common parallel platforms.
• Distributed memory implementations of this model usually have the compiler convert the
program into standard code with calls to a message passing library (MPI usually) to
distribute the data to all the processes. All message passing is done invisibly to the
programmer.
Parallel Programming Models

Other Models
• Other parallel programming models besides those previously mentioned certainly exist,
and will continue to evolve along with the ever changing world of computer hardware
and software. Only three of the more common ones are mentioned here.

Hybrid:

• In this model, any two or more parallel programming models are combined.
• Currently, a common example of a hybrid model is the combination of the message
passing model (MPI) with either the threads model (POSIX threads) or the shared
memory model (OpenMP). This hybrid model lends itself well to the increasingly
common hardware environment of networked SMP machines.
• Another common example of a hybrid model is combining data parallel with message
passing. As mentioned in the data parallel model section previously, data parallel
implementations (F90, HPF) on distributed memory architectures actually use message
passing to transmit data between tasks, transparently to the programmer.

Single Program Multiple Data (SPMD):

• SPMD is actually a "high

level" programming
model that can be built
upon any combination of
the previously mentioned
parallel programming
models.
• A single program is
executed by all tasks simultaneously.
• At any moment in time, tasks can be executing the same or different instructions within
the same program.
• SPMD programs usually have the necessary logic programmed into them to allow
different tasks to branch or conditionally execute only those parts of the program they are
designed to execute. That is, tasks do not necessarily have to execute the entire program -
perhaps only a portion of it.
• All tasks may use different data

Multiple Program Multiple Data (MPMD):

 • Like SPMD, MPMD is
actually a "high level"
programming model that
can be built upon any
combination of the
previously mentioned
parallel programming
models.
• MPMD applications typically have multiple executable object files (programs). While the
application is being run in parallel, each task can be executing the same or different
program as other tasks.
• All tasks may use different data

Designing Parallel Programs

Automatic vs. Manual Parallelization

• Designing and developing parallel programs has characteristically been a very manual
process. The programmer is typically responsible for both identifying and actually
implementing parallelism.
• Very often, manually developing parallel codes is a time consuming, complex, error-
prone and iterative process.
• For a number of years now, various tools have been available to assist the programmer
with converting serial programs into parallel programs. The most common type of tool
used to automatically parallelize a serial program is a parallelizing compiler or pre-
processor.
• A parallelizing compiler generally works in two different ways:
o Fully Automatic
o The compiler analyzes the source code and identifies opportunities for
parallelism.
o The analysis includes identifying inhibitors to parallelism and possibly a
cost weighting on whether or not the parallelism would actually improve
performance.
o Loops (do, for) loops are the most frequent target for automatic
parallelization.
o Programmer Directed
o Using "compiler directives" or possibly compiler flags, the programmer
explicitly tells the compiler how to parallelize the code.
o May be able to be used in conjunction with some degree of automatic
parallelization also.
• If you are beginning with an existing serial code and have time or budget constraints,
then automatic parallelization may be the answer. However, there are several important
caveats that apply to automatic parallelization:
 o Wrong results may be produced
o Performance may actually degrade
o Much less flexible than manual parallelization
o Limited to a subset (mostly loops) of code
o May actually not parallelize code if the analysis suggests there are inhibitors or
the code is too complex
• The remainder of this section applies to the manual method of developing parallel codes.

Designing Parallel Programs

Understand the Problem and the Program

• Undoubtedly, the first step in developing parallel software is to first understand the
problem that you wish to solve in parallel. If you are starting with a serial program, this
necessitates understanding the existing code also.
• Before spending time in an attempt to develop a parallel solution for a problem,
determine whether or not the problem is one that can actually be parallelized.
o Example of Parallelizable Problem:

Calculate the potential energy for each of several thousand

independent conformations of a molecule. When done, find the
minimum energy conformation.
o This problem is able to be solved in parallel. Each of the molecular conformations
is independently determinable. The calculation of the minimum energy
conformation is also a parallelizable problem.
o Example of a Non-parallelizable Problem:

Calculation of the Fibonacci series (1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,...) by use of the

formula:
F(n) = F(n-1) + F(n-2)

o This is a non-parallelizable problem because the calculation of the Fibonacci

sequence as shown would entail dependent calculations rather than independent
ones. The calculation of the F(n) value uses those of both F(n-1) and F(n-2).
These three terms cannot be calculated independently and therefore, not in
parallel.
• Identify the program's hotspots:
o Know where most of the real work is being done. The majority of scientific and
technical programs usually accomplish most of their work in a few places.
o Profilers and performance analysis tools can help here
o Focus on parallelizing the hotspots and ignore those sections of the program that
account for little CPU usage.
 • Identify bottlenecks in the program
o Are there areas that are disproportionately slow, or cause parallelizable work to
halt or be deferred? For example, I/O is usually something that slows a program
down.
o May be possible to restructure the program or use a different algorithm to reduce
or eliminate unnecessary slow areas
• Identify inhibitors to parallelism. One common class of inhibitor is data dependence, as
demonstrated by the Fibonacci sequence above.
• Investigate other algorithms if possible. This may be the single most important
consideration when designing a parallel application.

Designing Parallel Programs

Partitioning
• One of the first steps in designing a parallel program is to break the problem into discrete
"chunks" of work that can be distributed to multiple tasks. This is known as
decomposition or partitioning.
• There are two basic ways to partition computational work among parallel tasks: domain
decomposition and functional decomposition.

Domain Decomposition:

• In this type of partitioning, the data associated with a problem is decomposed. Each
parallel task then works on a portion of of the data.

• There are different ways to partition data:

Functional Decomposition:

• In this approach, the focus is on the computation that is to be performed rather than on
the data manipulated by the computation. The problem is decomposed according to the
work that must be done. Each task then performs a portion of the overall work.
• Functional decomposition lends itself well to problems that can be split into different
tasks. For example:

Ecosystem Modeling
Each program calculates the population of a given group, where each group's growth
depends on that of its neighbors. As time progresses, each process calculates its current
state, then exchanges information with the neighbor populations. All tasks then progress
to calculate the state at the next time step.

Signal Processing
An audio signal data set is passed through four distinct computational filters. Each filter
is a separate process. The first segment of data must pass through the first filter before
progressing to the second. When it does, the second segment of data passes through the
 first filter. By the time the fourth segment of data is in the first filter, all four tasks are
busy.

Climate Modeling
Each model component can be thought of as a separate task. Arrows represent exchanges
of data between components during computation: the atmosphere model generates wind
velocity data that are used by the ocean model, the ocean model generates sea surface
temperature data that are used by the atmosphere model, and so on.

• Combining these two types of problem decomposition is common and natural.

Designing Parallel Programs

Communications
Who Needs Communications?

The need for communications between tasks depends upon your problem:

• You DON'T need communications

o Some types of problems can be decomposed and executed in parallel with
virtually no need for tasks to share data. For example, imagine an image
processing operation where every pixel in a black and white image needs to have
its color reversed. The image data can easily be distributed to multiple tasks that
then act independently of each other to do their portion of the work.
o These types of problems are often called embarrassingly parallel because they
are so straight-forward. Very little inter-task communication is required.
• You DO need communications
o Most parallel applications are not quite so simple, and do require tasks to share
data with each other. For example, a 3-D heat diffusion problem requires a task to
know the temperatures calculated by the tasks that have neighboring data.
Changes to neighboring data has a direct effect on that task's data.

Factors to Consider:

There are a number of important factors to consider when designing your program's inter-
task communications:

• Cost of communications
o Inter-task communication virtually always implies overhead.
o Machine cycles and resources that could be used for computation are instead used
to package and transmit data.
o Communications frequently require some type of synchronization between tasks,
which can result in tasks spending time "waiting" instead of doing work.
o Competing communication traffic can saturate the available network bandwidth,
further aggravating performance problems.
• Latency vs. Bandwidth
o latency is the time it takes to send a minimal (0 byte) message from point A to
point B. Commonly expressed as microseconds.
o bandwidth is the amount of data that can be communicated per unit of time.
Commonly expressed as megabytes/sec or gigabytes/sec.
o Sending many small messages can cause latency to dominate communication
overheads. Often it is more efficient to package small messages into a larger
message, thus increasing the effective communications bandwidth.
• Visibility of communications
o With the Message Passing Model, communications are explicit and generally
quite visible and under the control of the programmer.
o With the Data Parallel Model, communications often occur transparently to the
programmer, particularly on distributed memory architectures. The programmer
 may not even be able to know exactly how inter-task communications are being
accomplished.
• Synchronous vs. asynchronous communications
o Synchronous communications require some type of "handshaking" between tasks
that are sharing data. This can be explicitly structured in code by the programmer,
or it may happen at a lower level unknown to the programmer.
o Synchronous communications are often referred to as blocking communications
since other work must wait until the communications have completed.
o Asynchronous communications allow tasks to transfer data independently from
one another. For example, task 1 can prepare and send a message to task 2, and
then immediately begin doing other work. When task 2 actually receives the data
doesn't matter.
o Asynchronous communications are often referred to as non-blocking
communications since other work can be done while the communications are
taking place.
o Interleaving computation with communication is the single greatest benefit for
using asynchronous communications.
• Scope of communications
o Knowing which tasks must communicate with each other is critical during the
design stage of a parallel code. Both of the two scopings described below can be
implemented synchronously or asynchronously.
o Point-to-point - involves two tasks with one task acting as the sender/producer of
data, and the other acting as the receiver/consumer.
o Collective - involves data sharing between more than two tasks, which are often
specified as being members in a common group, or collective. Some common
variations (there are more):

• Efficiency of communications
 o Very often, the programmer will have a choice with regard to factors that can
affect communications performance. Only a few are mentioned here.
o Which implementation for a given model should be used? Using the Message
Passing Model as an example, one MPI implementation may be faster on a given
hardware platform than another.
o What type of communication operations should be used? As mentioned
previously, asynchronous communication operations can improve overall program
performance.
o Network media - some platforms may offer more than one network for
communications. Which one is best?

Designing Parallel Programs

Synchronization
Types of Synchronization:

• Barrier
o Usually implies that all tasks are involved
o Each task performs its work until it reaches the barrier. It then stops, or "blocks".
o When the last task reaches the barrier, all tasks are synchronized.
o What happens from here varies. Often, a serial section of work must be done. In
other cases, the tasks are automatically released to continue their work.
• Lock / semaphore
o Can involve any number of tasks
o Typically used to serialize (protect) access to global data or a section of code.
Only one task at a time may use (own) the lock / semaphore / flag.
o The first task to acquire the lock "sets" it. This task can then safely (serially)
access the protected data or code.
o Other tasks can attempt to acquire the lock but must wait until the task that owns
the lock releases it.
o Can be blocking or non-blocking
• Synchronous communication operations
o Involves only those tasks executing a communication operation
o When a task performs a communication operation, some form of coordination is
required with the other task(s) participating in the communication. For example,
before a task can perform a send operation, it must first receive an
acknowledgment from the receiving task that it is OK to send.
o Discussed previously in the Communications section.
Designing Parallel Programs

Data Dependencies
Definition:

• A dependence exists between program statements when the order of statement execution
affects the results of the program.
• A data dependence results from multiple use of the same location(s) in storage by
different tasks.
• Dependencies are important to parallel programming because they are one of the primary
inhibitors to parallelism.

Examples:

• Loop carried data dependence

DO 500 J = MYSTART,MYEND
A(J) = A(J-1) * 2.0
500 CONTINUE

The value of A(J-1) must be computed before the value of A(J), therefore A(J) exhibits a
data dependency on A(J-1). Parallelism is inhibited.

If Task 2 has A(J) and task 1 has A(J-1), computing the correct value of A(J)
necessitates:

o Distributed memory architecture - task 2 must obtain the value of A(J-1) from
task 1 after task 1 finishes its computation
o Shared memory architecture - task 2 must read A(J-1) after task 1 updates it
• Loop independent data dependence

task 1 task 2
------ ------

X = 2 X = 4
. .
. .
Y = X**2 Y = X**3

As with the previous example, parallelism is inhibited. The value of Y is dependent on:
 o Distributed memory architecture - if or when the value of X is communicated
between the tasks.
o Shared memory architecture - which task last stores the value of X.
• Although all data dependencies are important to identify when designing parallel
programs, loop carried dependencies are particularly important since loops are possibly
the most common target of parallelization efforts.

How to Handle Data Dependencies:

• Distributed memory architectures - communicate required data at synchronization points.

• Shared memory architectures -synchronize read/write operations between tasks.

Designing Parallel Programs

Load Balancing
• Load balancing refers to the practice of distributing work among tasks so that all tasks
are kept busy all of the time. It can be considered a minimization of task idle time.
• Load balancing is important to parallel programs for performance reasons. For example,
if all tasks are subject to a barrier synchronization point, the slowest task will determine
the overall performance.

How to Achieve Load Balance:

• Equally partition the work each task receives

o For array/matrix operations where each task performs similar work, evenly
distribute the data set among the tasks.
o For loop iterations where the work done in each iteration is similar, evenly
distribute the iterations across the tasks.
o If a heterogeneous mix of machines with varying performance characteristics are
being used, be sure to use some type of performance analysis tool to detect any
load imbalances. Adjust work accordingly.
 • Use dynamic work assignment
o Certain classes of problems result in load imbalances even if data is evenly
distributed among tasks:
o Sparse arrays - some tasks will have actual data to work on while others
have mostly "zeros".
o Adaptive grid methods - some tasks may need to refine their mesh while
others don't.
o N-body simulations - where some particles may migrate to/from their
original task domain to another task's; where the particles owned by some
tasks require more work than those owned by other tasks.
o When the amount of work each task will perform is intentionally variable, or is
unable to be predicted, it may be helpful to use a scheduler - task pool approach.
As each task finishes its work, it queues to get a new piece of work.
o It may become necessary to design an algorithm which detects and handles load
imbalances as they occur dynamically within the code.

Designing Parallel Programs

Granularity
Computation / Communication Ratio:

• In parallel computing, granularity is a qualitative measure of the ratio of computation to

communication.
• Periods of computation are typically separated from periods of communication by
synchronization events.
 Fine-grain Parallelism:

• Relatively small amounts of computational work are done

between communication events
• Low computation to communication ratio
• Facilitates load balancing
• Implies high communication overhead and less opportunity
for performance enhancement
• If granularity is too fine it is possible that the overhead
required for communications and synchronization between
tasks takes longer than the computation.

Coarse-grain Parallelism:

• Relatively large amounts of computational work are done

between communication/synchronization events
• High computation to communication ratio
• Implies more opportunity for performance increase
• Harder to load balance efficiently

Which is Best?

• The most efficient granularity is dependent on the algorithm

and the hardware environment in which it runs.
• In most cases the overhead associated with communications
and synchronization is high relative to execution speed so it is
advantageous to have coarse granularity.

• Fine-grain parallelism can help reduce overheads due to load

imbalance.

Designing Parallel Programs

I/O
The Bad News:

• I/O operations are generally regarded as inhibitors to parallelism

• Parallel I/O systems may be immature or not available for all platforms
• In an environment where all tasks see the same file space, write operations can result in
file overwriting
• Read operations can be affected by the file server's ability to handle multiple read
requests at the same time
 • I/O that must be conducted over the network (NFS, non-local) can cause severe
bottlenecks and even crash file servers.

The Good News:

• Parallel file systems are available. For example:

o GPFS: General Parallel File System for AIX (IBM)
o Lustre: for Linux clusters (SUN Microsystems)
o PVFS/PVFS2: Parallel Virtual File System for Linux clusters
(Clemson/Argonne/Ohio State/others)
o PanFS: Panasas ActiveScale File System for Linux clusters (Panasas, Inc.)
o HP SFS: HP StorageWorks Scalable File Share. Lustre based parallel file system
(Global File System for Linux) product from HP
• The parallel I/O programming interface specification for MPI has been available since
1996 as part of MPI-2. Vendor and "free" implementations are now commonly available.
• Some options:
o If you have access to a parallel file system, investigate using it. If you don't, keep
reading...
o Rule #1: Reduce overall I/O as much as possible
o Confine I/O to specific serial portions of the job, and then use parallel
communications to distribute data to parallel tasks. For example, Task 1 could
read an input file and then communicate required data to other tasks. Likewise,
Task 1 could perform write operation after receiving required data from all other
tasks.
o For distributed memory systems with shared filespace, perform I/O in local, non-
shared filespace. For example, each processor may have /tmp filespace which can
used. This is usually much more efficient than performing I/O over the network to
one's home directory.
o Create unique filenames for each task's input/output file(s)