The Dynamic Kernel Scheduler—Part 1

Abstract

Emerging processor architectures such as GPUs and Intel MICs provide a huge performance potential for high performance computing. However developing software that uses these hardware accelerators introduces additional challenges for the developer. These challenges may include exposing increased parallelism, handling different hardware designs, and using multiple development frameworks in order to utilise devices from different vendors.The Dynamic Kernel Scheduler (DKS) is being developed in order to provide a software layer between the host application and different hardware accelerators. DKS handles the communication between the host and the device, schedules task execution, and provides a library of built-in algorithms. Algorithms available in the DKS library will be written in CUDA, OpenCL, and OpenMP. Depending on the available hardware, the DKS can select the appropriate implementation of the algorithm.The first DKS version was created using CUDA for the Nvidia GPUs and OpenMP for Intel MIC. DKS was further integrated into OPAL (Object-oriented Parallel Accelerator Library) in order to speed up a parallel FFT based Poisson solver and Monte Carlo simulations for particle–matter interaction used for proton therapy degrader modelling. DKS was also used together with Minuit2 for parameter fitting, where χ2 and max-log-likelihood functions were offloaded to the hardware accelerator. The concepts of the DKS, first results, and plans for the future will be shown in this paper.