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Copyright Tristan Aubrey-Jones May 2008.
Abstract: A project investigating and developing an implicitly concurrent programming language, based on a metaphor taken from the physical world is reported. Uses a programming paradigm where programs consist of systems of autonomous agents, or active objects which communicate via message passing. A language enhancing Java with actors and linear types is presented. Example programs are written, compiled, and executed to evaluate the usefulness of the language. The language found to provide a familiar notation for implicit parallelism, and a compelling new model for concurrency, combining the performance of shared variables with the elegance of message passing.
Introductory Slides (PDF),
Report (PDF),
ActiveJava compiler prototype (ajavac),
ActiveJava runtime library (ajava_lang).
Examples:
calc - pocket calculator actor program
dining - dining philosophers actor program (never deadlocks)
sort - parallel quicksort implementation ("SortBenchmark" sorts 10,000 random integers using actors, java threads, and sequentially and compares)
To compile examples use:compile.bat ./calc compile.bat ./sort compile.bat ./diningTo run examples use:
run ./calc Main run ./dining Main run ./dining Main fast run ./sort Main run ./sort SortingBenchmark
Sorting Benchmark Actors: 612ms Threads: 693ms Sequential: 972ms 12:51 16/04/2008 On Roo with 6 Processors 100 repetitions, array size: 1000,000 with identical arrays MIN_PARTITION_SIZE 100,000 -- Sorting Benchmark Actors: 554ms Threads: 564ms Sequential: 547ms 13:00 16/04/2008 On Tristan-64 with 1 Processor 100 repetitions, array size: 1000,000 with identical arrays MIN_PARTITION_SIZE 100,000 --- Sorting Benchmark Actors: 658ms Threads: 691ms Sequential: 1019ms 12:51 16/04/2008 On Roo with 6 Processors 100 repetitions, array size: 1000,000 with identical arrays MIN_PARTITION_SIZE 100,000; Process priority high --- Sorting Benchmark Actors: 67ms Threads: 73ms Sequential: 77ms 12:39 16/04/2008 On Roo with 6 Processors 100 repetitions, array size: 100,000 with identical arrays MIN_PARTITION_SIZE 10,000 -- Sorting Benchmark Actors: 51ms Threads: 54ms Sequential: 52ms 12:41 16/04/2008 on Tristan-64 with 1 Processor 100 repetitions, array size: 100,000 with identical arrays MIN_PARTITION_SIZE 10,000 -- Sorting Benchmark Actors: 6ms Threads: 21ms Sequential: 3ms 13:15 16/04/2008 On Tristan-64 with 1 Processor 100 repetitions, array size: 10,000 with identical arrays MIN_PARTITION_SIZE 500 --- Sorting Benchmark Actors: 30ms Threads: 37ms Sequential: 7ms 13:20 16/04/2008 On Roo with 6 Processors 100 repetitions, array size: 10,000 with identical arrays MIN_PARTITION_SIZE 500