Teaching parallel processing using free resources
Janet Hartman, David Adrian Sanders · 2002
Parallel processing can be taught effectively even though parallel hardware is not available. Free software is available to support the three major paradigms of parallel computing. Parallaxis is a software simulator that is based on the SIMD model. PVM and MPI allow one to treat a network of workstations as a message passing MIMD multicomputer with distributed memory. A locally developed shared memory simulator supports the MIMD model of computing with a common shared memory. While none of these products is superior to an actual parallel computer, each can be used in a variety of courses to give students experience with parallel algorithms.