Randall Fisher's Home Page at Aggregate.Org

Contact Information:

• email: randall.fisher@ieee.org or randall.fisher@acm.org or randall.fisher@wmich.edu

Career Background:

• Vita in HTML.
• Vita in PostScript.
• Vita in Portable Data Format.

Spring Courses at Western Michigan University

• ECE2100 Circuit Analysis.
• ECE2510 Introduction to Microprocessors.
• ECE6050 Advanced Microprocessor Applications.

Research:

The SWAR parallel processing model:

Multimedia extensions use SWAR to speed up algorithms related to multimedia applications, but don't really provide a complete general-purpose model. The goal of this work was to provide such a model, and some basic implementations, to the general public.

I presented an introduction to SWAR and an overview of issues that need to be addressed when designing a SWAR-based computational model (such as a language) at the spring meeting of the Midwest Society for Programming Languages and Systems (MSPLS). This meeting was held at Loyola University Chicaga on May 16, 1998. Here are the slides for the talk: Issues in the Design of SWAR Programming Models.

I also presented a more in-depth description of the requirements for compiling for SWAR targets at the 11th annual Workshop on Languages and Compilers for Parallel Computing (LCPC98). This took place at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, on August 7-9, 1998. Here is a draft of the slides for the talk: Compiling for SIMD Within A Register. This was a presentation of a paper of the same name. The final version (ps, pdf), (© Springer-Verlag), has been published as part of the LNCS series.

On Sept. 23rd, 1998, I gave a talk at the Parallel Processing Seminar at Purdue University, which was a combination of information from the above presentations.

I also presented a more in-depth description of the requirements for compiling for SWAR targets at the 12th annual Workshop on Languages and Compilers for Parallel Computing (LCPC99). This took place at The University of California at San Diego, on August 4-6, 1999. Here are the slides for the talk: The Scc Compiler: SWARing at MMX and 3DNow!. This was a presentation of a paper of the same name. The final version (© Springer-Verlag), will be published as part of the LNCS series.

Here are a few web pages about SWAR:

• The SWAR Home Page
• The SWAR page in the Linux Parallel Processing HOWTO.
• libMMX - A public-domain C function interface to the MMX family of multimedia extensions.
• libXMMX - A public-domain C function interface to Cyrix's Extended MMX family of multimedia extensions.
• libSSE - A public-domain C function interface to Intel's SSE (formerly KNI) family of multimedia extensions.
• Sources for Scc - An experimental SWARC module compiler.

Parallel Computing Clusters:

• Here is Tim Mattox at one of the clusters I worked on at Purdue.
• Here is the first 16-machine linux video-wall cluster, which we assembled at Purdue for SuperComputing one year. It is actually a combination of three separate clusters joined into one (using scalable PAPERS units). On the left is an 8-machine video wall using a stack of PS/2's. In the black cabinet in the center (door is closed) are four more machines. In the open rack are four more. This was one of the more impressive exhibits at the time - We had LOTS of foot traffic.

Teaching:

Links for Students of Languages, Compilers, and Operating Systems:

• Here are some tutorials and primers I have thrown together to help students in these courses.

Some Parallel Processing Links:

• The Aggregate Home page (Successor to the PAPERS/CARP group at Purdue)