Optimizing FDTD electromagnetic field computation on distributed networks

✍ Scribed by C. J. Gillan; V. F. Fusco

• Book ID: 101285742
• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1998
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 87 KB
• Volume: 11
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0894-3370
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1099-1204(199811/12)11:6<277::aid-jnm312>3.0.co;2-o

✦ Synopsis

The solution of Maxwell's equations is considered using the finite difference time domain (FDTD) method and the client-server software paradigm on a heterogeneous network of distributed computers. The performance of compilers is evaluated and the PVM 3.3 message-passing harness, in both its conventional and TCP mode of operation, is compared with direct calls to the lesser known TCP/IP routines on the operating system. An example is given showing the impact of using different floating-point representations, in each subdomain, when computing field updates. As far as we are aware to date, there has been no discussion of the actual content of the communication between concurrent FDTD processes; accordingly we have defined one such protocol.