11.1 Easy Parallel Programing and Execution in the STA Environment

Fig. 11-1 Concept of the STA system
PPDE provides an easy programing environment by managing information and tools necessary for parallel program development in a unified manner. PPExe provides an easy execution environment to carry out a distributed computation in a heterogeneous computer network. In this environment, program development and execution are carried out without interruption of the stream of thinking (Seamless Thinking Aid: STA).

Fig. 11-2 An example of a fluid/structure coupled simulation in the PPExe environment
Motion of a wing of an airplane coupled with air motion is calculated. Motion of the air was calculated by the computer A, and the motion of the structure of the wing was calculated by the computer B. The simulation was carried out by exchanging data between the two computers in the PPExe environment.

Parallel computers and/or distributed computer systems are going to play a leading part in the field of the computational science and engineering. With new network computer systems including parallel computers, however, it is considerably difficult to carry out development, correction, improvement, and execution of programs efficiently in comparison with conventional computer systems. The reason is because the necessary tools for the above tasks are not standardized, and common procedures to use the tools are not established. This situation necessarily requires extremely complicated operations to utilize the tools efficiently. In order to overcome this difficulty we developed the "Seamless Thinking Aid (STA)" system, which supports "seamless thinking" of programmers during the above processes necessary for the utilization of parallel distributed computer systems (Fig. 11-1).
The STA system is composed of two parts. The first part is the "Parallel Program Developing Environment (PPDE)" which is, so to speak, a kind of supporting system for developers of parallel computation programs. In this environment all information necessary for the development of a program is controlled automatically by the system and a user can develop a program for parallel distributed computer systems as easily as a personal computer without the complicated procedure necessary in a conventional environment. The second part of the STA system is the "Parallel Program Execution environment (PPExe)" in which a parallel computation program for a system composed of different types of parallel computers can be executed efficiently without manual operations. The function of the environment is, so to speak, that of a control tower for the flows of data and the behaviors of the program of the parallel distributed computations. In this environment, for example, one can carry out efficiently the comprehensive computation of a fluid-structure coupled system composed of air and an airplane flying in the air, by combining the results of calculations of the fluid flow and the airplane structure carried out by the computers A and B, respectively (Fig. 11-2).

Reference
H. Ohta et al., Development of STA (Seamless Thinking Aid) Programing Environment of Parallel Library in JAERI, Keisan Kogaku Koenkai Ronbunshu, 2 (1), 97 (1997).

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