Characterization of TCC on Chip-Multiprocessors

Transactional Coherence and Consistency (TCC) is a novel coherence scheme for shared memory multiprocessors that uses programmer-defined transactions as the fundamental unit of parallel work, synchronization, coherence, and consistency. TCC has the potential to simplify parallel program development and optimization by providing a smooth transition from sequential to parallel programs. In this paper, we study the implementation of TCC on chip-multiprocessors (CMPs). We explore design alternatives such as the granularity of state tracking, doublebuffering, and write-update and write-invalidate protocols. Furthermore, we characterize the performance of TCC in comparison to conventional snoopy cache coherence (SCC) using parallel applications optimized for each scheme. We conclude that the two coherence schemes perform similarly, with each scheme having a slight advantage for some applications. The bandwidth requirements of TCC are slightly higher but well within the capabilities of CMP ...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2005
• Where: IEEEPACT
• Authors: Austen McDonald, JaeWoong Chung, Hassan Chafi, Chi Cao Minh, Brian D. Carlstrom, Lance Hammond, Christos Kozyrakis, Kunle Olukotun
• Keywords: Coherence Schemes, Hardware, IEEEPACT 2005, Parallel Programs, Transactional Coherence