CSC/ECE 506 Fall 2007

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Peer-reviewed Assignment 1

• Sections 1.1 and 1.1.2
  • Update performance trends in multiprocessors.

• Section 1.1.1, first half: Scientific/engineering application trends
  • What characterizes present-day applications?
  • How much memory, processor time, etc.?
  • How high is the speedup?

• Section 1.1.1, second half: Commercial application trends
  • What characterizes present-day applications?
  • How much memory, processor time, etc.?
  • How high is the speedup?

• Section 1.1.3: Architectural trends
  • How have architectures changed in the past 10 years?
  • Update Figs. 1.8 and 1.9 with new points, for 2000, 2002, 2004, 2006, and 2007.

• Section 1.1.4: Supercomputers
  • Compare current supercomputers with those of 10 yrs. ago.
  • Update Figures 1.10 to 1.12 with new data points. For 1.12, consult top500.org.

• Sections 1.2.1 and 1.2.4: Communication architecture
  • Trends in last 10 years.
  • How has data parallelism found its way into shared-memory and message-passing machines? An early example would be MMX.
  • Would you change the number of layers in Fig. 1.13?

• Section 1.2.2: Shared address space
  • Any changes in the organization of address spaces in the last 10 years?
  • Are the interconnection structures different in new computers now than they were 10 years ago?
  • What is the size and capacity of current SMPs?
  • How have supercomputers evolved since the Cray T3E?

• Section 1.2.3: Message passing
  • Are blade servers an extension of message passing?
  • How have blade architectures evolved over the past 10 years?

• Section 1.2.5: Trends in vector processing and array processing.
  • New machines have recently been announced. Why will this be an important architectural dimension in the coming years?

• Section 1.2.6
  • New developments in dataflow and systolic architectures, if any.
  • Or if not, why are these styles not evolving with time?

• Sections 1.3.1 and 1.3.2: Communication and programming model
  • How have reordering strategies evolved to accommodate larger multicomputers?
  • Have new kinds of synchronization operations been developed?
  • I doubt that other topics covered in these sections have changed much, but do check.

• Sections 1.3.3 and 1.3.4: Most changes here are probably related to performance metrics.
  • Cite other models for measuring artifacts such as data-transfer time, overhead, occupancy, and communication cost. Focus on the models that are most useful in practice.