Proposal for a Common Parallel File System Programming Interface 1.0
Peter Corbett{1}, Jean-Pierre Prost{1},
Chris Demetriou, Garth Gibson, Erik Riedel, Jim Zelenka,
Yuqun Chen{2}, Ed Felten{2}, Kai Li{2},
John Hartman{3}, Larry Peterson{3},
Brian Bershad{4}, Alec Wolman{4},
Ruth Aydt{5}
October 1996
School of Computer Science
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
sio-os-api@cs.princeton.edu
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/Web/Groups/PDL/SIO
{1}IBM T. J. Watson Research Center
{2}Department of Computer Science, Princeton University
{3}Department of Computer Science, The University of Arizona
{4}Computer Science & Engineering, University of Washington
{5}Department of Computer Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Abstract
This document proposes an interface to
parallel file systems intended
for use with a variety of parallel computers.
This proposal is based on the separation of programmer convenience
functions from high-performance enabling functions. We propose that
the former be supported above this interface, possibly in client
libraries. The latter, functions that enable high performance, are
defined by this proposed API under the assumption that these functions
are more likely to need system and vendor-specific support.
Specifically, this proposal includes functions which support reading
and writing with scatter-gather addressing for memory and file ranges,
and asynchronous operations. It also includes mechanisms that permit
client control over client caching, and file access and layout hints.
Finally, it includes a mechanism by which this API can be extended and
extensions for fast file copy and batching collective I/O
operations.
Also appears as Technical Report CACR-130, Scalable I/O Initiative,
Caltech Center for Advanced Computing Research,
Pasadena, CA, November 1996.
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