Computer Science 400 Parallel Processing Siena College Fall 2008

As you know, this course requires you to complete a final project that will determine 20% of your grade. You may choose your own topic related to parallel processing to study in more detail than we have as a class. Your project should include programming, but the amount may vary from topic to topic. A formal research paper and brief (20-30 minute) presentation at a minisymposium to be held during our last meeting are required.

You may work individually or together. This decision must be made by 3:30 PM, Wednesday, October 29, 2008.

Please start thinking about a topic right away and come to me with your ideas. By 11:59 PM, Wednesday, November 5, 2008, submit a proposal, no more than one page in length, that describes your topic, what you plan to investigate, and how you plan to go about it. If you will need access to any special hardware or software, include that in your proposal. Submit as a PDF file proposal.pdf.

By 4:00 PM, Friday, November 21, 2008, submit a progress report. This should consist of a detailed outline (or better yet, an early draft) of your paper including sources, and a description of the design and current implementation status of your software, as well as a timetable for completion of the project. Submit a PDF file progress.pdf.

This is to be a formal research paper, and should be organized as such. You should begin with a title, author list, and abstract. The main body of the paper should be organized into sections including (i) an introduction in which you describe the general topic and the particular aspects you will be examining, (ii) one or more sections comprising your main text, where you describe what you have done, how you have done it, and what you have learned, (iii) a conclusion, which should include ideas for future investigation into your topic which were beyond the scope of your paper, and (iv) a complete list of citations. Citations of web pages are acceptable in some circumstances, but books, articles in conference proceedings or journals, or technical reports are preferred. Examples of papers that fit the expected format will be provided.

Proper English and a good technical writing style are important. Writing well is very difficult - it is an iterative process and cannot be done all at once. Be precise and be concise. Check your spelling and grammar carefully. I expect most papers will be around 15 single-sided pages, using 1.5 spacing, one inch margins, and a 12-point Times Roman font (or as close as you can come). Please do not adjust margins and font sizes to force a certain length. You are encouraged but not required to use LaTeX to typeset your paper. The LaTeX example in my shared area is already set up with an appropriate format. Length is not important - content and quality are. Papers shorter than 10 pages or longer than 20 pages are acceptable, if the length is appropriate for the content.

Submit a draft, as complete as possible, as a PDF file draft.pdf by 3:30 PM, Wednesday, December 3, 2008. The more complete this draft, the better feedback I can give you to improve it and the more you can focus on programming over the last week or two. You may also submit additional drafts for feedback, but keep in mind that it may take me a day or two to get to them. Submit your final version as a PDF file paper.pdf by 4:00 PM, Monday, December 8, 2008.

You should submit your source code and instructions on how to build and run it. The software should be described in the paper. Please make arrangements to demonstrate the program. Source code should be submitted and demonstrations completed by 4:00 PM, Monday, December 8, 2008.

Each group will present a summary of their work to the class. Include background information on your topic, a description of what you did, and a summary of what you learned. Software demonstrations may also be appropriate. Prepare slides or web pages. Rehearse your presentation, paying special attention to timing.

This final project accounts for 20% of the course grade. The grade will be based on all aspects of the project, including the proposal (5%), the progress report (5%), the design, documentation, style, and correctness of the software developed (0-30%), the content and writing style of the draft (15%) and final version (30-60%) of the paper, and quality of the presentation (15%).

Here are some ideas to consider when choosing your topic:

• Applying parallel computing to solve a problem in insert field of interest here
• Parallel computing on the desktop: multicore chips
• Grid computing, internet computing
• High-end parallelism: computing with thousands of processors
• Quantum computing
• Parallel discrete event simulation
• Bioinformatics
• Parallel data mining
• Partitioning and dynamic load balancing for heterogeneous and hierarchical systems
• Performance analysis for parallel programs
• Parallel and distributed visualization
• Parallel programming in Java
• Parallel programming languages
• Parallelizing compilers
• Actor model of parallel computation
• Hybrid programming models, such as combining MPI for inter-node communication with OpenMP for intra-node communication

These are just ideas, and you should not restrict yourself to this list. I hope you will find an appropriate topic that you find interesting. You might also find it useful to browse the topics and abstracts of the talks at the current or previous Supercomputing conferences or the SIAM Conference on Parallel Processing for Scientific Computing to get a feel for some current research projects in parallel processing.

If you wish to use or refer to any software libraries or outside source code beyond the standard language (C, C++, Java) libraries, check with me first. All sources must be cited properly. If in doubt about anything related to academic honesty, ask now and avoid problems later!