ZAPP
Zero Assignment Parallel Processor. A virtual tree machine architecture in which
a process tree is dynamically mapped onto a fixed, strongly connected network of
processors communicating by message passing. The basic operation of each node is
to apply a divide and conquer function which takes four arguments: (1) a
function 'primitive' which takes a problem description (PD) and returns true if
it can be solved without division, (2) a function 'solve' which takes a
primitive PD and returns its solution, (3) a function 'divide' which takes a PD
and returns a list of PDs of smaller problems and (4) a function 'combine' which
returns the solution to a problem by combining a list of solutions of
subproblems.
Each node has a copy of the code and one is given the initial problem
description. Task distribution is by process stealing in which a process
constructs a descriptor for each subtask and idle (lightly loaded) processors
can steal a descriptor from a physically connected neighbour.
Nearby terms:
za « ZAP « zap « ZAPP » Z-buffer » ZEBRA »
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