JCSE, vol. 6, no. 4, pp.294-309, 2012

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5626/JCSE.2012.6.4.294

Computational Methods for On-Node Performance Optimization and Inter-Node Scalability of HPC Applications

Byoung-Do Kim, Carlos Rosales-Fernandez, Sungho Kim
Advanced Research Computing, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA/ Texas Advanced Computing Center, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA/ Supercomputing Center, Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information, Daejeon, Korea

Abstract: In the age of multi-core and specialized accelerators in high performance computing (HPC) systems, it is critical to understand application characteristics and apply suitable optimizations in order to fully utilize advanced computing system. Often time, the process involves multiple stages of application performance diagnosis and a trial-and-error type of approach for optimization. In this study, a general guideline of performance optimization has been demonstrated with two class-representing applications. The main focuses are on node-level optimization and inter-node scalability improvement. While the number of optimization case studies is somewhat limited in this paper, the result provides insights into the systematic approach in HPC applications performance engineering.

Keyword: Application optimization; Scalability; Performance engineering; Computational modeling

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