Skip to main content

ScaLAPACK: A portable linear algebra library for distributed memory computers — Design issues and performance

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 1041))

Abstract

This paper outlines the content and performance of ScaLA-PACK, a collection of mathematical software for linear algebra computations on distributed memory computers. The importance of developing standards for computational and message passing interfaces is discussed. We present the different components and building blocks of ScaLAPACK. This paper outlines the difficulties inherent in producing correct codes for networks of heterogeneous processors. Finally, this paper briefly describes future directions for the ScaLAPACK library and concludes by suggesting alternative approaches to mathematical libraries, explaining how ScaLAPACK could be integrated into efficient and user-friendly distributed systems.

This work was supported in part by the National Science Foundation Grant No. ASC-9005933; by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency under contract DAAL03-91-C-0047, administered by the Army Research Office; by the Office of Scientific Computing, U.S. Department of Energy, under Contract DE-AC05-84OR21400; and by the National Science Foundation Science and Technology Center Cooperative Agreement No. CCR-8809615.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  1. E. Anderson, Z. Bai, C. Bischof, J. Demmel, J. Dongarra, J. Du Croz, A. Greenbaum, S. Hammarling, A. McKenney, S. Ostrouchov, and D. Sorensen. “LAPACK Users' Guide”. SIAM, Philadelphia, PA, 1992.

    Google Scholar 

  2. E. Anderson, Z. Bai, C. Bischof, J. Demmel, J. Dongarra, J. Du Croz, A. Greenbaum, S. Hammarling, A. McKenney, S. Ostrouchov, and D. Sorensen. “LAPACK Users' Guide, Second Edition”. SIAM, Philadelphia, PA, 1995.

    Google Scholar 

  3. J. Choi, J. Dongarra, and D. Walker. “Parallel Matrix Transpose Algorithms on Distributed Concurrent Computers”. Technical Report UT CS-93-215, LAPACK Working Note #65, University of Tennessee, 1993.

    Google Scholar 

  4. J. Demmel and K. Stanley. “The Performance of Finding Eigenvalues and Eigenvectors of Dense Symmetric Matrices on Distributed Memory Computers”. In Proceedings of the Seventh SIAM Conference on Parallel Proceesing for Scientific Computing. SIAM, 1994.

    Google Scholar 

  5. J. Dongarra, J. Du Croz, I. Duff, and S. Hammarling. “A Set of Level 3 Basic Linear Algebra Subprograms”. ACM Transactions on Mathematical Software, 16(1):1–17, 1990.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. J. Dongarra, J. Du Croz, S. Hammarling, and R. Hanson. “Algorithm 656: An extended Set of Basic Linear Algebra Subprograms: Model Implementation and Test Programs”. ACM Transactions on Mathematical Software, 14 (1):18–32, 1988.

    Google Scholar 

  7. J. Dongarra and R. van de Geijn. “Two dimensional Basic Linear Algebra Communication Subprograms”. Technical Report UT CS-91-138, LAPACK Working Note #37, University of Tennessee, 1991.

    Google Scholar 

  8. J. Dongarra, R. van de Geijn, and D. Walker. “A Look at Scalable Dense Linear Algebra Librairies”. Technical Report UT CS-92-155, LAPACK Working Note #43, University of Tennessee, 1992.

    Google Scholar 

  9. J. Dongarra and R. C. Whaley. “A User's Guide to the BLACS v1.0”. Technical Report UT CS-95-281, LAPACK Working Note #94, University of Tennessee, 1995.

    Google Scholar 

  10. Message Passing Interface Forum. “MPI: A Message-Passing Interface standard”. International Journal of Supercomputer Applications, 8(3/4), 1994.

    Google Scholar 

  11. G. Fox, M. Johnson, G. Lyzenga, S. Otto, J. Salmon, and D. Walker. “Solving Problems on Concurrent Processors”, volume 1. Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J, 1988.

    Google Scholar 

  12. R. Hanson, F. Krogh, and C. Lawson. “A Proposal for Standard Linear Algebra Subprograms”. ACM SIGNUM Newsl, 8(16), 1973.

    Google Scholar 

  13. W. Hsu, G. Thanh Nguyen, and X. Jiang. “Going Beyond Binary”. http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/ xjiang/cs258/project_1.html, 1995. CS 258 Class project.

    Google Scholar 

  14. C. Lawson, R. Hanson, D. Kincaid, and F. Krogh. “Basic Linear Algebra Subprograms for Fortran Usage”. ACM Transactions on Mathematical Software, 5(3):308–323, 1979.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Jack Dongarra Kaj Madsen Jerzy Waśniewski

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 1996 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

About this paper

Cite this paper

Choi, J. et al. (1996). ScaLAPACK: A portable linear algebra library for distributed memory computers — Design issues and performance. In: Dongarra, J., Madsen, K., Waśniewski, J. (eds) Applied Parallel Computing Computations in Physics, Chemistry and Engineering Science. PARA 1995. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 1041. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-60902-4_12

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-60902-4_12

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-60902-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-49670-0

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

Publish with us

Policies and ethics