July 16, 2009

So I finished my calculations for how to optimize the distribution of calculation tasks given C number of processor cores available and n number of data points. Here are the equations:

*There is a typo. There is supposed to be a 'C' between the '/' and the '*' in the second equation

So the first equation calculates the total number of comparisons that need to be made. The second, given q (the current core number), calculates what comparison that core should start at. The final one takes that and calculates what data point to start at for that core. I've already written the program that can be run on multiple computers, it just needs to know how many total cores are available, how many data points there are, and what the current core number is.