Virtual shared memory-based support for novel (parallel) programming paradigms

Discusses the implementation of novel programming paradigms on virtual shared memory (VSM) parallel architectures. A wide spectrum of paradigms (data-parallel, functional and logic languages) have been investigated in order to achieve, within the context of VSM parallel architectures, a better understanding of the underlying support mechanisms for the paradigms and to identify commonality amongst the different mechanisms. An overview of VSM is given in the context of a commercially available VSM machine: a KSR-1. The correspondence between the features of the high level languages and the VSM features which assist efficient implementation are presented. Case studies are discussed as concrete examples of the issues involved