On the FACR( l) algorithm for the discrete Poisson equation

Abstract Direct methods for the solution of the discrete Poisson equation over a rectangle are commonly based either on Fourier transforms or on block-cyclic reduction. The relationship between these two approaches is demonstrated explicitly, and used to derive the FACR( l ) algorithm in which the Fourier transform approach is combined with l preliminary steps of cyclic reduction. It is shown that the optimum choice of l leads to an algorithm for which the operation count per mesh point is almost independent of the mesh size. Numerical results concerning timing and round-off error are presented for the N × N Dirichlet problem for various values of N and l . Extensions to more general problems, and to implementation on parallel or vector computers are briefly discussed.