harter@sun.pcl.ac.uk (Ed Hart) (04/19/91)
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THE TRANSIM AND GECKO TOOLSET
A Prototyping Package for Transputer Systems
Polytechnic of Central London
Most large structures - ships, aeroplanes, buildings -
are not designed from scratch without preparing a model
first, and the same approach can be taken in parallel
computing. The Transim/Gecko combination of tools
enable visualisation and performance evaluation of a
transputer system before the full code is written or the
hardware put together.
The toolset comprises a simulator (Transim) and a graph-
ical front-end (Gecko). Transim will simulate the
behaviour of an application program running on Inmos
transputers; simulating a single process or an applica-
tion running on a large network. The input being a com-
plete description of the hardware - link speeds,
timeslice periods, network topology, etc., plus an algo-
rithm description section designed to facilitate the
process of transferring a mental picture of an algorithm
onto paper. The output of the simulator can be fed into
Gecko, which will then build an animated diagram of the
network, in colour, showing the activity of each pro-
cess, cpu and link as it varies in time throughout the
execution of the algorithm. Parallel execution, alter-
nation, channel communication, timeslicing, priorities,
interrupts, concurrent operation of transputer links,
effects of external memory and so on are taken into
account. A special facility is provided for experimen-
tation in the mapping of processes to processors.
Written in: C language.
Running on: Sun 3: colour or monochrome or without
graphics if Transim is used alone. IBM PC or com-
patible: Transim only, no graphics.
Contact: Ed Hart
Centre for Parallel Computing,
115 New Cavendish Street, London, W1M 8JS, UK.
Email: harter@uk.ac.pcl.sun
Telephone: 071-911 5000 ext 3659
Fax: 071-911 5089
Answerphone: 071-911 5099
Price: Sun: 1000 pounds + VAT, Transim alone 800 pounds
+ VAT, academics: 50% discount. IBM: Transim alone
300 pounds, no discounts.
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