Re: [gomp] Challenges in Implementing OpenMP

[Gabriel Dos Reis <gdr at cs dot tamu dot edu>]

Scott Robert Ladd <coyote@coyotegulch.com> writes:

| > Up to prototyping tools you're right, but just thinking at instruction
| > level parallelism for which we're far from producing good code these
| > days, I'm sure that you didn't meant the last joke about reducing the
| > role of the compiler in the chain.
| 
| Good point, though work is being done to improve vectorization. In my
| experience, class-level parallelization does not provide the same
| level of optimization that is found in a compiler-level solution. (I
| note Diego's message, which came in as I write this, speaks to much
| the same effect.)

I guess it depends on what you call "class-level parallelization".

And if you declare something as religious, then there is hard to say
anything about it. semi ;-)

| > As a last remark, I would like to say that I'm not very enthusiastic
| > on having OpenMP in GCC, but this is a norm that, in my opinion, goes
| > in a right direction by allowing the programmer to control (in a very
| > unsafe way) the optimizers working downstairs.
| 
| I agree that OpenMP is imperfect, as are all technologies; but, as you
| say, it is a "norm." Intel, IBM, Sun, Kai, SGI, Absoft, PGI, Lahey,
| and others have implemented OpenMP in their compilers, with Pathscale
| and Microsoft following suit in the near future. People have ported
| OpenMP concepts to other languages, including Java. Recent RFPs from
| the U.S. National Laboratories have considered OpenMP to be an
| essential component of Fortran compilers.

You know, there are lots of projects going on with US national labs
and it hard to pick a funding of one project to mean a general
direction -- both of us are just arguing about apparently opposed
things the labs are interested in.


-- Gaby