P-CAM: a framework for parallel complex systems simulations

Abstract History has taught that the design and implementation of an efficient parallel simulation program is a tedious and error prone process. Methods that can circumvent the parallelization steps in this process are usually warmly welcomed by parallel simulation architects. In this paper we introduce a Parallel Cellular Automata Modeling environment (P-CAM) for doing spatial load balancing on arbitrary connected grids or task graphs. This environment adopts an object oriented application framework in which we can instantiate a variety of simulation problems. We have implemented a kernel, based on this framework, which facilitates dynamic load balancing and supports process migration and irregular interprocess communication patterns. The design of the kernel enables a transparent implementation of complex systems models onto arbitrary parallel computer systems. We show that the design of a parallel simulation program can be assisted by using the P-CAM kernel.

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