ParallelPointers:Graphs

BreadthfirstSearch(BFS)101
GivenavertexS,whatisthedistanceofalltheotherverticesfromS?

Whywouldthisbeuseful?Tofindthefastestroutethroughanetwork.

TodoaBFSkeepadistanceforeachvertex.
1.
Sisthefirstvertexitis0distancefromitself.Setalltheotherverticestoinfinity.
2.
BeginatS.Lookatitsimmediateneighbors.TheirdistanceforSis1.
3.
Nowmovetotheseimmediateneighborsandmarkthedistancebetweenthese
neighborsasone.
4.
Dothisforeachvertexinthegraph.

EachsuccessiveadvancementverticesbeingexaminediscalledaFrontier.

StartwithagraphG.
Setallthedistancestoinfinity
Setthesourcedistanceto0

DeterminethefrontierFofS

Lookateachvertexinthefrontier
Examineeachneighborwofeach
vertex

Ifthedistanceofthatneighboris
infinity,ithasnotbeenvisited.

Ifithasnotbeenvisitedthe
neighborsdistanceisthevertexs
distance+1

Dothisforallverticesinthesearch.

Whatdoesthisalgorithmcost?Bycostwemeanrunningtime.
1.
Thefrontieronlygrowswhenanunvisitedverticesisinserted.Whichmeansthefrontier
canonlybeaslargeasthenumberofvertices.
2.
Eachedgeisvisitedatmostonce,ifthegraphisdirected.

3.
Ifthegraphisundirected,eachedgewillbevisitedatmosttwice.
Thismeanstheruntimeislinearandthesizeofthegraph

BFSQuizNotethisisadirectedgraph.

WhenlookingforneighborsofSlookonlyat
thoseverticesthatgoINTOS,notoutofit.For
example,disaneighborofSandfisNOT.

AnalysisIsBFSInherentlySequential?
Canthisalgorithmbeparallelized?
Thereisabottleneckintherelationshipbetweenextractingv,insertingw.

TheavailableparallelismisW/Dwhichisdependentupon
|E|/|V|.

Isthisagoodthingornot?

Inreallife,graphsaresparse.So|E|=O(|V|).Thismeansthe
averageavailableparallelismwillbeaconstantandthatisbad.

Thisleadstotheconclusionthatthesequentialalgorithmisbad.

IntuitionWhywemightdobetter

TheBFSvisitsthegraphinwaves.Therearetwoimportantimplicationsfromthisfact:
1.
Theupperboundonthespanshouldbethenumberofwaves,notthenumberof
vertices.Thesewavesarecalledlevels.Alevelisalloftheverticesequidistanttothe
source.
Thediameterofagraphisthemaximumshortestdistancebetweenanypairofvertices.
Diameterisapropertyofthewholegraph,andisanupperboundonthenumberoflevels
ofanystartingvertex.
Levelsynchronoustransversalisvisitingthenodeslevelbylevel.

2.
IfyouperformalevelsynchronousBFS,thentheorderinwhichyouvisiteachvertexofa
givenfrontierisimmaterial.Thismeanswecanvisitthematthesametime.

Sothisisanopportunityforparallelismalltheverticesofafrontiercanbevisitedatthe
sametime.

HighLevelApproachtoParallelBFS

1.
2.

CarryouttheBFSlevelbylevel(notvertexbyvertex)
Processtheentirelevelinparallelwecandothisbecausetheorderinwhichthe
verticesarevisitedshouldnotmatter.

Thisisverysimilartotheserialversion,withafew
exceptions.

l0..thecodeislevelsynchronous.
Thisisthelevelcountersetto0

Thefrontiersreferencedarealsolevelspecific(Fl)

ll+1.incrementsthecounter

Thespan(definedbythewhileloop)willbeno
largerthanthediameterofthegraph

Processlevelwill:takethegraphandthecurrent
frontier.Itwillproduceanewfrontierandupdatethe
distances(D)

Bag:KeyProperties
ThedatastructuretobeusedwiththeparallelBFSisabag.
Abaghasthefollowingdataproperties:
Thedataisanunorderedcollection
Itwillallowrepetition
Allowredundantinsertionsofthesamevertex,ifnecessary

Abaghasthefollowingoperationalproperties:

Fasttraversal
Fastandlogicallyassociativeunionandsplit

LogicallyassociativemeansifAUB==BUA

ThiswillalsogivetheabilitytoapplyReducerHyperObjects.

Pennant,BuildingBlocksforBags

Pennantis:atreewith2knodesandaunaryroot
havingachild.thechildistherootofacompletebinary
tree.

Xistheroot
Xsisthecompletebinarytree

Iftherearetwopennants,andtheyareEXACTLYTHE
SAMESIZE(|X|==|Y|)

Thenthetwopennantscanbe
combined.

1.
Chooseoneoftherootstobe
therootofthecombinedpennant.
2.
Thetwopennantsarenow
childrenoftheroot.

Thecombinationisalsoapennant.
Therewillnowbe2k+1nodes.

Thiswasfairlyeasy,itinvolvedrearrangingpointers.

Thereverse,splittingapennantintotwopennantscan
bedoneusingthereverseofthegivenmethod.

CombiningPennantsintoBags
Pennantsaregoodforrepresentingcollectionsthathaveasize2N,butthereneedstobe
somethingforothersizecollections.

Abagneedstocontainanysizecollection.Howcanpennantsbeusedtoformbags?

Anexampleofpennantsusedtoputacollectioninabag.
23items.Dividedintogroupsofpowersof2.(23=10111)

Toconnectthesegroups,useanarrayofpointers,usethenullpointerforanyemptybits.
Thisarrayiscalledaspine.

Toinsertanewelementintothecollection.
1.
TrytoinsertitintotheLSB
2.
IftheLSBisoccupied,combinetheLSBwiththenewelementandcarryit.
3.
MovetothenextLSB,repeattheprocess.

WhatistheCostofInsertion?
Rememberwheninsertinganelement,youmayneedtotraversetheentirespine.
AnintegerofsizeNneedsNbitstostoreitspower.
Insertinganelementissimplyamatterofshufflingpointers.

IttakesthesameasymptotictimetoinsertNelementsintoabagasitdoestoinsert1.
Theamortizedtimetoinsertelementsintoabagisconstant.

BagSplitting

Arightbitshiftisthesameadivisionbytwo.

Tosplitabaganemptybagisalsonecessary.
Splitthepennantinhalf.
Store1ofthehalvesinthesparebagandoneinthenextlowerbitonthebag.

Thecostofsplittingabag..

FinishingtheParallelBFSwithBags

Ifthebagisbigenoughusedivideand
conquerotherwiseusethesequentialmethod.

Thedifferencewiththissequentialmethodisthe
forloopthisusesaparallelforloop.

Thereisadataracehereaseachtasktriesto
updatetheneighbors.Thisisperfectlysafe
here.

Thecostsaretrickyforthisexperiment.
Spanisaffectedbythenumberoflevels.
Spanofprocesslevelhas3parts:depth,costofsplitting,costofthebasecase.