Lesson plan
Automatic vectorization
Automatic vectorization, in parallel computing, is a special case of automatic parallelization, where a computer program is converted from a scalar implementation, which processes a single pair of operands at a time, to a vector implementation, which processes one operation on multiple pairs of operands at once. For example, modern conventional computers, including specialized supercomputers, typically have vector operations that simultaneously perform operations such as the following four additions (via SIMD or SPMD hardware): : \begin{align} c_1 & = a_1 + b_1 \\ c_2 & = a_2 + b_2 \\ c_3 & = a_3 + b_3 \\ c_4 & = a_4 + b_4 \end{align} However, in most programming languages one typically writes loops that sequentially perform additions of many numbers. Here is an example of such a loop, written in C: for (i = 0; i A vectorizing compiler transforms such loops into sequences of vector operations. These vector operations perform additions on blocks of elements from the arrays a , b and c . Automatic vectorization is a major research topic in computer science.
Article summary
Automatic vectorization, in parallel computing, is a special case of automatic parallelization, where a computer program is converted from a scalar implementation, which processes a single pair of operands at a time, to a vector implementation, which processes one operation on multiple pairs of operands at once. For example, modern conventional computers, including specialized supercomputers, typically have vector operations that simultaneously perform operations such as the following four additions (via SIMD or SPMD hardware): : \begin{align} c_1 & = a_1 + b_1 \\ c_2 & = a_2 + b_2 \\ c_3 & = a_3 + b_3 \\ c_4 & = a_4 + b_4 \end{align} However, in most programming languages one typically writes loops that sequentially perform additions of many numbers. Here is an example of such a loop, written in C: for (i = 0; i A vectorizing compiler transforms such loops into sequences of vector operations. These vector operations perform additions on blocks of elements from the arrays a , b and c . Automatic vectorization is a major research topic in computer science.
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Discussion questions
- Summarise the article in your own words. Which single claim would you verify first, and why?
- Which claim in this article is most likely to be revised as the sources update? How would you check its current status?
- If two sources disagreed about one of these facts, what would you need in order to trust one over the other?
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