Event Tracing and Visualization for Cell Broadband Engine Systems

Authors:
Daniel Hackenberg;Holger Brunst;Wolfgang E. Nagel
Affiliations:
Center for Information Services and High Performance Computing (ZIH), Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany 01062;Center for Information Services and High Performance Computing (ZIH), Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany 01062;Center for Information Services and High Performance Computing (ZIH), Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany 01062
Venue:
Euro-Par '08 Proceedings of the 14th international Euro-Par conference on Parallel Processing
Year:
2008

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Abstract

Event-based software tracing is a common technique for developing and optimizing parallel applications. It provides valuable information to application designers. This paper discusses software tracing on the Cell Broadband Engine, a heterogeneous multi-core processor, which is widely used in video game consoles, blade servers, and even supercomputer studies. However, the complex design of the Cell architecture poses challenging problems to developers. Our new monitoring approach improves this situation significantly as it visualizes Cell specific events on the SIMD cores that are usually hidden to programmers. We use the Vampir tool suite for visualization. Our design seamlessly integrates with the respective MPI monitor which additionally enables the tracking of large hybrid Cell/MPI applications.