ALua: flexibility for parallel programming

摘要

In this paper we present ALua, an event-driven communication mechanism for developing distributed parallel applications, based on the interpreted language Lua. We propose a dual programming model for parallel applications, where ALua acts as a gluing element, allowing precompiled program parts to run on different machines. We show, through examples, how three types of applications can benefit from the flexibility that derives from this model. We then present a study of ALua's performance, by comparing execution times of two parallel applications written in ALua with their counterparts written in PVM.