Using OpenMP: Portable Shared Memory Parallel Programming (Scientific and Engineering Computation) (Paperback)

by Barbara Chapman (Author), Gabriele Jost (Author), Ruud van der Pas (Author), David J. Kuck (Foreword)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"The advent of readily-available inexpensive multi-core processors has made parallel programming more important and more accessible than ever before. OpenMP is a popular way to write parallel programs, and this book makes OpenMP knowledge available to the average programmer in an understandable, easy-to-apply fashion, while still providing information for those who wish to dive more deeply into the subject."
—Larry Meadows, CEO, the OpenMP ARB

Product Description
"I hope that readers will learn to use the full expressibility and power of OpenMP. This book should provide an excellent introduction to beginners, and the performance section should help those with some experience who want to push OpenMP to its limits."
—from the foreword by David J. Kuck, Intel Fellow, Software and Solutions Group, and Director, Parallel and Distributed Solutions, Intel Corporation

OpenMP, a portable programming interface for shared memory parallel computers, was adopted as an informal standard in 1997 by computer scientists who wanted a unified model on which to base programs for shared memory systems. OpenMP is now used by many software developers; it offers significant advantages over both hand-threading and MPI. Using OpenMP offers a comprehensive introduction to parallel programming concepts and a detailed overview of OpenMP.

Using OpenMP discusses hardware developments, describes where OpenMP is applicable, and compares OpenMP to other programming interfaces for shared and distributed memory parallel architectures. It introduces the individual features of OpenMP, provides many source code examples that demonstrate the use and functionality of the language constructs, and offers tips on writing an efficient OpenMP program. It describes how to use OpenMP in full-scale applications to achieve high performance on large-scale architectures, discussing several case studies in detail, and offers in-depth troubleshooting advice. It explains how OpenMP is translated into explicitly multithreaded code, providing a valuable behind-the-scenes account of OpenMP program performance. Finally, Using OpenMP considers trends likely to influence OpenMP development, offering a glimpse of the possibilities of a future OpenMP 3.0 from the vantage point of the current OpenMP 2.5.

With multicore computer use increasing, the need for a comprehensive introduction and overview of the standard interface is clear. Using OpenMP provides an essential reference not only for students at both undergraduate and graduate levels but also for professionals who intend to parallelize existing codes or develop new parallel programs for shared memory computer architectures.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 353 pages
• Publisher: The MIT Press (October 31, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0262533022
• ISBN-13: 978-0262533027
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 8 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #66,784 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Performance on a Multicore Machine - Try OpenMP?, May 5, 2008

By	NumericalMethodsGuy "Mechanical Engineering P... - See all my reviews

I have most of the parallel computing books out there so I am sort of a collector of sorts. Most focus on either the basics of parallel programming, MPI, OpenMP, both, or some other less popular (yet) paradigm e.g. PFortran, TBB, etc. With every parallel-computing wanna be buying a multicore machine dual, quad, dual-quad, etc., the parallel computing software "industry" is in flux. No longer will MPI on a cluster be enough. It still remains to be seen whether the slower memory bus on quad core machines will allow for speedups without major code overhaul or a new paradigm. Anyway, this book is a welcome addition to my collection. For one, it is current e.g. 2008 and also it is focussed on OpenMP (but does treat dual MPI/OpenMP programming). It is well written (I am about 100 pages in since I just got my copy last week) and has one tantalizing chapter entitled "How to get good performance by using OpenMP" - which is really timely since my new 72 core machine (9 dual Intel quad cores) seems to give slower performance for a major commercial CFD code than the equivalent number of dual-core nodes). I hope it helps me. Based on the rapid growth of multicore machines and the lack of a simple programming solution, I recommend this book to all those wanting to try and get their codes running fast on multicore machines. The only downsides in this book so far is the lack of downloadable code (you have to type it in yourself) and it is hard to test the code fragments because they are just that - fragments. A nice feature of the book is the 50/50 emphasis on Fortran/C codes - which are the still the mainstay in large-scale scientific computing.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A practical and well-priced book, April 4, 2009

By	calvinnme "Texan refugee" (Fredericksburg, Va) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)

The OpenMP specification can be downloaded from the web, but it is not a really a good starting point for learning how to write real programs using the OpenMP constructs. However, this book does have a lot of material that you really don't need just to write programs. This extra information is in the form of context and information on parallel computing in general, since this book is really intended to double as a textbook and a practical guide for professionals. The following briefly describes the contents.

Chapter one contains some background information on OpenMP and its applications. You can skip it if you are not interested in this or already know the material.
Chapter two is a brief overview of the features of OpenMP at a high level. It discusses how OpenMP deals with problems that come from the complex memory hierarchy that exists on modern computers.
Chapter three is a good starting point if you know you need OpenMP, know why you need it, and just need to get something going. It discusses a complete OpenMP program in both C and Fortran that uses a couple of OpenMP's most widely used features, plus it explains the basics of the OpenMP syntax. The problem discussed is specifically how to perform a matrix times a vector operation in parallel.
Chapter four is a more complete overview of the OpenMP programming paradigm and it contains many example programs. First the most widely used features are introduced with a focus on those features that enable work to be shared among multiple threads. The scope narrows until the author is down to some of OpenMP's less widely known features. The programs start simple and get more complex as the chapter progresses, always staying within the field of scientific computing.
Chapters five and six go together, and discuss how to optimize performance with OpenMP. There are a number of practical programming tips and an extended example that gives insight into the process of investigating performance problems.
Chapter seven talks about program correctness and troubleshooting. This can be hard to do in shared-memory parallel programs.
Chapter 8 is on translation by the compiler of an OpenMP program into an application that can be executed in parallel. It talks about behind the scenes occurrences with OpenMP computing including the operation of OpenMP-aware compilers, performance tools, and debuggers. It also discusses strategies for obtaining high performance.
Chapter 9 is a special topics chapter and discusses trends that could influence extensions to the OpenMP specification in the future. Obviously it is not necessary for the practicing professional to know this, but it is interesting.

My perspective is that of someone that knows I must use OpenMP, and I need good concrete examples and an accompanying tutorial to get me going. Chapters three through eight were ideal for my purpose. Other books I examined ran the gamut from talking about why OpenMP is important and lacking practical details, to overpriced textbooks, to books that were about OpenMP plus some other parallel programming paradigms and weren't specific or modern enough. This one is clear, concise, modern, and the price can't be beat. The only drawback for me was the dual emphasis on C and Fortran, but then I'm sure the Fortran information is still useful to a good number of programmers.