Computation Migration: Enhancing Locality for Distributed-Memory Parallel Systems

We describe computation migration,a new technique that is based on compile-time program transformations, for accessing remote data in a distributed-memory parallel system. In contrast with RPC-style access, where the access is performed remotely, and with data migration, where the data is moved so that it is local, computation migration moves part of the current thread to the processor where the data resides. The access is performed at the remote processor, and the migrated thread portion continues to run on that same processor; this makes subsequent accesses in the thread portion local. We describe an implementation of computation migration that consists of two parts: an implementation that migrates single activation frames, and a high-level language annotation that allows a programmer to express when migration is desired. We performed experiments using two applications; these experiments demonstrate that computation migration is a valuable alternative to RPC and data migration.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 1993
• Where: PPOPP
• Authors: Wilson C. Hsieh, Paul Wang, William E. Weihl
• Keywords: Computation Migration, Data Migration, Distributed And Parallel Computing, PPOPP 1993, Thread Portion