Introduction to Control Flow

Abstract

Modern supercomputer designs fall into distinct categories – data and control flow supercomputer design paradigms. Control flow stands as the go-to design philosophy in all von Neumann machines dominating the market thus far. New types of problems demand a different flow mindset – this is where the data flow machines come in play. This chapter introduces control-flow concept as well as its state-of-the-art examples. Introduction section goes over definitions of terms used in succeeding chapters and gives their brief explanations. A brief explanation of supercomputing as a whole given in the Introduction section is then followed by explanations of the data and control flow design philosophies, with real-world examples of both – multi-core, many-core, vector processors, and GPUs in Control Flow Paradigm section. The third section covers real-world processing unit examples, with a rundown of the best standard and low power commercial and supercomputing market representatives.