PVM Toolkit for Windows Jan Kwiatkowski1,2, Piotr Hojnor2 Cezary Janikow 2 Computer Science Department, 1 Math and Computer Science Department Wrocław University of Technology University of Missouri – St. Louis Wybrzeże Wyspiańskiego 27 8001 Natural Bridge Rd, 50-370 Wrocław, Poland St. Louis, MO 63121, USA phone: (+48)(71) 3203602 phone: (314)5166352 fax: (+48)(71) 3211018 fax: (314)5165400 e-mail: {kwiatkowski,hojnor}@ci.pwr.wroc.pl e-mail: [email protected] Abstract: In the past years, computing has been ronment, which emulates a distributed-memory moving from the sequential world to the parallel multiprocessor in a heterogeneous networked one, from centralized organization to decentral- environment. Reasons for the wide acceptance ized. This paper presents a short description of a and popularity of PVM for scientific computa- PVM (Parallel Virtual Machine) toolkit, devel- tions include availability of heterogeneous net- oped and implemented for the Windows operat- works and simple programming interfaces. Cur- ing system. It is intended to provide a graphical rently, PVM is available for a variety of hard- interface for PVM administration and process ware and software platforms, from personal monitoring. The toolkit will assist the user in the computers to supercomputers. Generally, PVM management of the virtual environment, and it consists of a daemon and PVM libraries, provid- can be used for PVM application tuning. The ing fundamental environment functionalities [5]. toolkit consists of a remote shell daemon Additionally, there are a number of auxiliary (RSHD), remote shell client (RSH), remote copy tools, such as graphical visualization of PVM client (RCP), and an administrative tool similar programs, administrative and other tools, which to XPVM, which serves administrative and extend the basic PVM functionally. Unfortu- monitoring functions. nately, such tools are not available for Windows. Therefore, a user must use a text console for all Keywords: distributed environments, PVM envi- PVM related functions. This text-based interface ronment, distributed processing, administrative is hard to use. Additionally, only two program- tools ming languages, Visual C++ and Visual Fortran, can be used for programming under PVM for 1 Introduction Windows. These are the main motivations for the work presented in this paper. The main objective In the past years, computing has been moving is to design and implement a PVM Toolkit for from the sequential world to the parallel one, Windows, to provide a graphical user interface from a centralized organization to decentralized. for PVM administration and process monitoring, There is also a large diversity of paral- and to support multiple languages. The toolkit lel/distributed computer organizations, including consists of a remote shell daemon (RSHD), re- those made possible by high-speed networks. mote shell client (RSH), remote copy client Thus, distributed parallel programming using (RCP), and an administrative tool similar to networked computers became one of the most XPVM, which serves administrative and moni- attractive and cheap ways to increase the com- toring functions [7]. This paper is organized as puting power [1,4]. In particular, the message- follow. Section 2 briefly describes the design. passing paradigm became very popular. PVM Section 3 presents basic functionalities of (Parallel Virtual Machine) is a software envi- RSHD, RSH and RPC. Section 4 presents the main functionalities of the administrative tool. the output window to display the incoming mes- Finally, section 5 summarizes this work and sages in the graphic mode. This allows very discusses future extensions planned. effective use of the PVM libraries in the graphical Windows environment - the libraries 2 Design overview do not have to be modified. void pvm_printf(char *fmt, ...) As mentioned, except for the classical PVM text { va_list va; console, there are no administrative tools sup- if (fmt) porting the PVM implementation for Windows { va_start(va, fmt); (WINPVM). Moreover, only two programming Vsprintf(commBuff, fmt, va); languages: Visual C++ and Visual Fortran, can Va_end(va); } /* if */ currently be used for programming under PVM for Windows. In this work, we extend the PVM #ifdef WINMAIN implementation for Windows [2,3]. First, we if (applHandle) provide a graphical monitoring console similar SendMessage(applHandle, to XPVM, to be used for environment manage- PRINTFMESSAGE, commBuff, 0); else #endif ment and to assist in tracing and tuning perform- printf("%s", commBuff); } ance of specific applications. Second, we provide additional useful tools, and extend the standard The above tools allow us to design and im- functionalities of other tools: plement the graphical console. Similarly to • A new RSHD server, allowing remote XPVM, to capture tracing information at run- process invocation to UNIX computers time, the user only needs to compile his program (feature not available in the standard using PVM libraries (some additional changes in PVM for Windows). the standard tracer were needed). Data captured during execution is immediately presenting (and • RSH shell, allowing adding new hosts to animated) by the new graphical console. All execute in PVM (there are some com- tracing information can be also stored in external mercial version, but very costly). files for later use such as for post-mortem analy- • RCP client, allowing distributing the ap- sis. Additionally, the user programs can be writ- plication code. ten in Borland C++ and Borland Delphi in addi- All pvm functions placed in the PVM libraries tion to Visual C++ and Fortran. communicate with the user utilizing the printf family of functions. It causes some problems 3 Remote Shell Daemon RSHD with programming under WINAPI. So, to allow easier interfacing in the graphical mode, a new RSHD daemon acts as a server for remote shell pvm_print function, presented below, is provided (RSH) and remote file copy (RCP). RSHD is a in the PVM libraries (module newcrt.c). service available on the UNIX operating system. This function checks if the invoked PVM li- Therefore, we need to provide RSHD for Win- brary function is to be used in the graphic mode. dows in order for PVM to communicate with If so, an internal Windows Message signals to UNIX. The new RSHD uses the same algorithm Fig.1. The main window of the Remote Shell Daemon as RSHD for UNIX BSD [6]. Additionally, it is used for defining the most commonly used equipped with a graphical user interface, which operations; the third, History, is used for allows changes to the execution environment storing the operations; and the last provides without having to restart it. The new daemon the command line. An operation is selected serves some useful functions such as: allowing by a click, and subsequently executed by the debugging, verifying the. .rhost file, checking Run button. secure connection conditions, manual and remote The graphical console of the RCP service can testing of Windows architecture (95/98, NT, work in two modes. First, when the architecture 2000), redirecting stdout and stderr, of the chosen host is recognized by the RSH choosing the localization of “temp files” service, the RCP main window is divided into ($TEMP or current directory). The RSHD two parts, one for the server and one for the re- graphical interface is presented in Figure 1. mote host (this allows text copying using the The main window consists of two parts. The drag and drop method). Second, if the architec- top of window is a menu with the following op- ture is not recognized, the RCP window provides tions: File|Close – close the application, the standard command line. Stop/Start - close or start the tracing process (the state of RSHD is stored to allow restarting from the last configuration), Settings – enable switch- 4 The PVM Graphical Console for ing on/off the above mentioned functionalities, Windows and Help - get the information about the avail- able options. The PVM graphical console assists the PVM The bottom of the main window is the central user in management of the virtual environment, widget where the results of the selected options and in monitoring the execution of the applica- are displayed. This display can be, at any time, tion. The main window of this console contains copied to the Windows clipboard. After three parts, as presented in Figure 2. The top part minimizing, the program is automatically saved is a toolbar containing iconic shortcuts for the as an icon tray. most often used user commands. The user can The RSH is a client for RSHD, it is used customize these. In the illustration, we have: for executing remote commands on a given Quit, Halt, RunRTSK and Help. Quit and Halt host. RSH services include a graphical con- are equivalent to quit and halt from the PVM sole, which is divided into four parts. The text console, RunRTSK starts the tools presented first part, Results, is used for showing the in the previous section, and Help presents infor- results of execution; the second, Aliases, is mation about the available options. The com- Fig.2. The main window of the administrative PVM console tool mands are selected with the mouse. text console, however, with improved interface. The middle part is the Page Control line con- The display widget is divided here into two taining Tabs Sheets for different visualizations of parts: the result panel, which presents the results the virtual machine. This simplifies management of the recently executed commands in a standard of the virtual machine because it allows the user way, and command line, where any pvm com- to concentrate on the most desired display fea- mand can be entered. The results displayed in the tures. The available Tab Sheets are: Commands, result panel are not lost but instead they are Tasks, Watch, Space-Time and Hosts. The de- buffered and can be viewed with the scrollbar. fault Tab Sheet is Commands. The remaining They can also be copied in the clipboard. The part of the main window is the central widget command line can be scrolled using the keyboard where the execution traces are displayed, as ac- arrow keys to retrieve command history.