Date: Sat, 22 Jun 1996 00:14:28 -0700 (PDT) From: "James E. [Jed] Donnelley" <jed@webstart.com> To: Ron Minnich <rminnich@sarnoff.com> Cc: Thomas Pfenning <thomaspf@microsoft.com>, davidg@Root.COM, smp@freebsd.org, jed@llnl.gov, mail@ppgsoft.com Subject: RE: SMP version? Message-ID: <199606220714.AAA27881@aimnet.com>
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At 08:34 PM 6/21/96 -0700, Thomas Pfenning <thomaspf@microsoft.com> wrote: >You might want to have a look at the work Ron Minnich is doing with >FreeBSD and his distributed shared memory implementation. > >ftp://ftp.sarnoff.com/pub/mnfs/www/docs/cluster.html > >Cheers > > Thomas As you can learn in a bit greater detail below, we at LLNL are considering using an open version of Unix (e.g. FreeBSD or Linux) for an SMP running on multiple Intel processors connected via Scalable Coherent Interface: http://www.cmpcmm.com/cc/standards.html#SCI I was referred to your work as above. I did look at your Web page as noted. The focus there seems to be on message passing (e.g. MPI?). Did I read that incorrectly? We are currently focusing on shared memory. As you will read below, our project will only be worthwhile if we can run a multiprocessing application with multiple processors sharing a common memory image (different register sets - e.g. as the Unicos model). We are not interested in pursuing "virtual" shared memory at this time (though I would be interested to hear of any work you have done in this area - particularly performance studies). We are trying to determine how much work it will be to get "there" from "here" using SCI (over our in-house developed optical network). I have previously developed such an operating system from scratch, but would naturally hope to be able to get such a system running from a FreeBSD or Linux base with much (!) less effort. Any thoughts from your experience that you would be willing to share would be greatly appreciated. >>From: James E. [Jed] Donnelley[SMTP:jed@webstart.com] >>Sent: Friday, June 21, 1996 7:50 PM >>To: davidg@Root.COM >>Cc: smp@freebsd.org; jed@llnl.gov >>Subject: Re: SMP version? >> >>At 05:38 PM 6/21/96 -0700, you wrote: >>>>I am looking for a symmetric multiprocessing version >>>>of Unix that I can get sources to. Do you know if there >>>>is such a version of FreeBSD (or Linux? ;-) available? >>>> >>>>Sorry for the "out of the blue" message. My application >>>>is a Scalable Coherent Interface (SCI) shared memory >>>>multiprocessor research project based on some unique >>>>optical networking technology at Lawrence Livermore >>>>National Laboratory. >>> >>> We (the FreeBSD project) are just starting our work on SMP support. We >>>have a working single-kernel-lock implementation and if the sources aren't >>>available for it now, they will be in a week or two. It's my understanding >>>that similar progress has been made in Linux, but I'm not associated with >>>that effort so I don't know its status. >>> If you're interested, I can put you in touch with the people working on >>>it...in fact, you can send email to smp@freebsd.org to contact the >>>appropriate >>>people. >>> Good luck on your project. >> >>Do you (either of you) happen to know if there is a facility in >>this system (FreeBSD for an SMP) for a single shared memory >>"multiprocess." That is for multiprocessing on a single shared >>memory image (with separate register sets)? Is there a defined >>Posix interface to such memory sharing (beyond the mechanism that >>I have seen in System V)? Any documentation that you could point >>us at on this topic would be appreciated. >> >>I am trying to estimate the cost of using FreeBSD to support such >>shared >>memory multiprocessing on an Intel/SCI based shared memory >>multiprocessor. >>We need to have the ability to run a single "job" using shared >>memory on multiple processes to make the effort worthwhile. >> >>Assuming this sort of work would make sense, is there a community >>that we could collaborate with and potentially contribute code to? Thanks for any reply. --Jed http://www.webstart.com/cc/jed-signature.html
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