A task migration implementation of the Message-Passing Interface

Abstract

In order to use networks of workstations in parallel processing applications, several schemes have been devised to allow processes on different, possibly heterogeneous, platforms to communicate with one another. The Message-Passing Interface (MPI) is one such scheme that allows for message-passing across different architectures. The MPI specification does not make provisions for the migration of a process between machines. This paper describes the work required to modify, an MPI implementation to allow for task migration. It also describes Hector, our heterogeneous computing task allocator that is used to migrate tasks automatically and improve the overall performance of a parallel program.