The ALPS Kernel for Processor Networks

ALPS is an operating system kernel which provides support for developing portable and e cient parallel programs for MIMD machines. It achieves this by supporting a new paradigm for parallel programming, wherein the shared or distributed nature of memory and the topology of the processor interconnection are transparent to the programmer. Using the ALPS approach, a programmer of a processor network can write a portable parallel program which does not depend on the interconnection topology, and which can still be executed e ciently. This paper presents the ALPS kernel primitives and their implementation on a Transputer network and a Hypercube, and demonstrates how topology independence and e cient scheduling can be achieved in a single framework. Key phrases: Operating Systems, Parallel Processing, Processor Networks, Topology Independence, Object-Oriented Programming. The ALPS project is supported by the National Science Foundation under grant CCR-8810388. e er e r r cess r et r s anas andal, ahendra amachandran and rasad ishnu hotla epartment of omputer and Information cience he hio tate niversit , olum us, hio 1 -1 e a : a s s. -s a e.e