Tutorial given at WAM-BAMM*05
March 31, 2005
San Antonio, TX

Parallel (P-) GENESIS: its use and applications

Greg Hood, University of Pittsburgh

Abstract

In this tutorial we will discuss the use of PGENESIS to reduce the time needed to perform length simulations or multiple simulations. PGENESIS is targeted at two main areas: simulating large networks by partitioning them across multiple processors, and performing multiple concurrent simulations for tasks such as parameter searching. The tutorial will treat topics such as efficient network partitioning, sychronization issues, parallel I/O, parallel parameter searching, load balancing, scaling behavior, and debugging strategies. We will present an in-depth example of PGENESIS scripts for a large network, and for controlling a parameter search. We will also review pertinent considerations when selecting parallel hardware to run on, how to get supercomputing time for large problems, and compare PGENESIS with alternative approaches for dealing with large-scale models.

See the tutorial (Powerpoint presentation) pgenesis.ppt

Download the example PGENESIS scripts (gzipped tar file) Hood-examples.tar.gz


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