Genoa Active Message Machine is a high-performance driver wrapper designed for the Linux kernel, offering low latency and improved throughput.
One of the key features of Genoa Active Message MAchine is its ability to support both single and dual CPU processing nodes (Intel IA-32 or x86_64). The system also runs on Gigabit Ethernet and has good programmability with a fairly high abstraction level. Additionally, it includes reliable mechanisms for retransmission of missing packets.
To run the system, Genoa Active Message MAchine is implemented as a network device driver for Linux 2.6 and released under GNU GPL. The system is meant for use with Network Of Workstations (NOWs) and clusters of PCs interconnected by modern, industry-standard LAN fabrics such as Gigabit Ethernet, Myrinet, and SCI.
The system overcomes the usual drawback of standard PC clusters, which is the poor performance of the support to inter-process communication over the interconnect. With its low-latency, high-throughput communication services based on Active Ports, Genoa Active Message MAchine delivers reliable and efficient communication services for parallel and distributed applications running on Linux clusters.
The Genoa Active Message MAchine driver delivers both point-to-point and broadcast communications, with broadcast communication exploiting the Ethernet broadcast directly. It is also capable of managing standard IP traffic when no parallel job is in progress, which ensures that all IP services remain up and running even when the cluster is not in use.
The communication mechanisms implemented in the Genoa Active Message MAchine driver are available to application writers through the GAMMA user library. The library provides support to application launches, process grouping, point-to-point/broadcast communications based on the Active Ports mechanisms, and some collective routines like barrier synchronization and broadcast.
Genoa Active Message MAchine provides two levels of QoS. The lower QoS level provides best-effort service and the fastest communications, while the other QoS level provides flow-controlled communication, ensuring reliability up to hardware faults, with negligible performance penalties.
Installing the Genoa Active Message MAchine driver requires only two small and marginal patches to the original Linux kernel, and the Linux kernel extended by the driver must be installed on each PC in the cluster. Additionally, a porting of MPI atop GAMMA is available, called MPI/GAMMA.
Overall, Genoa Active Message MAchine is ideal for Linux clusters of PCs who require a low-latency, high-throughput communication system that offers reliability and efficiency in parallel and distributed applications. With its many features, it offers a cost-effective architecture for parallel and distributed applications while improving the support for inter-process communication over the interconnect. This latest release is updated to 2.6.24 and was modified to be installable as a module.
Version 14-February-2008: N/A