COMPILER OPTIMIZATIONS, EXECUTION ENVIRONMENTS, AND PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS AND TUNING TOOLS FOR....

IN THE LAST FEW YEARS, THE PERFORMANCE OF MICROPROCESSORS USED IN WORKSTATIONS HAS INCREASED DRAMATICLLY, AND ADVANCESIN VLSI TECHNOLOGY ASSURE CONTINUING PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT IN THE FUTURE. SCIENTIFIC COMPUTING ASSOCIATES, INC. HAS MADE SIGNIFICANT PROGRESS IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF AN EFFICIENT IMPLEMENTATION OF THE LINDA COORDINATION LANGUAGE ALLOWING PARALLEL PROGRAMS TO BE RUN ON A NETWORK OF WORKSTATIONS. THIS PROJECT WILL DESIGN AND IMPLEMENT VARIOUS NETWORK LINDA OPTIMIZATION STRATEGIES TO IMPROVE THE EFFICIENCY AND SCALABILITY OF NETWORK LINDA APPLICATION PROGRAMS. MANY OF THESE OPTIMIZATIONS ARE DIRECTLY APPLICABLE TO OTHER DISTRIBUTED MEMORY IMPLEMENTATIONS OF LINDA FOR MASSIVELY PARALLEL PROCESSORS. TO AID THE DESIGN OF THE OPTIMIZATIONS AND TO ALSO PROVIDE A PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS TOOL FOR PROGRAMMERS DEVELOPING APPLICATIONS USING NETWORK LINDA, A PROFILING TOOL WILL BE DESIGNED AND IMPLEMENTED. FINALLY, A NETWORK LINDA EXECUTION DAEMON WILL BE DEVELOPED, ALLOWING LINDA PROGRAMS TO BE EASILY AND EFFICIENTLY INVOKED, WHILE MINIMIZING THE IMPACT OF LINDA COMPUTATIONS ONOTHER USERS OF THE NETWORK. THE COMBINATION OF PROGRAMMING CONVENIENCE PROVIDED BY LINDA WITH THE RAW COMPUTE POWER NASCIENT IN MODERN WORKSTATION NETWORKS PROVIDES AN UNPARALLEL TOOL FOR LOW-COST, HIGH-PERFORMANCE COMPUTING. ANTICIPATED BENEFITS/POTENTIAL COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS - LINDA IS RAPIDLY BECOMING A STANDARD TOOL FOR PROGRAMMING MIMD SYSTEMS. LOCAL-AREA NETWORKS (LANS) OF WORKSTATIONS ARE OBVIOUS, IN-PLACE (AND THEREFORE INEXPENSIVE), SCALABLE, AND LARGELY UNTAPPED MIMD RESOURCES THAT CAN BE EXPLOITED BY USING SCIENTIFIC'S NETWORK LINDA SYSTEM. THIS PROPOSAL WILL LEAD TO SIGNIFICANT IMPROVEMENTS THAT SHOULD ENABLE PROGRAMMERS TO EFFECTIVELY AND ROUTINELY TURN LANS INTO VIRTUAL "HYPERCOMPUTERS." THE POTENTIAL IMPACT IN BOTH THE GOVERNMENTAL AND COMMERCIAL ARENAS IS ENORMOUS, GIVEN THAT THOUSANDS