Ia-64 and Elementary Functions: Speed and Precision

Summary

• Covers every major elementary function, including square root and division
• IA-64 architecture and Explicit Parallel Instruction Computing (EPIC), in depth
• By an active participant in HP's IA-64 development team
• For every professional building high-performance IA-64 server applications and operating systems

Optimizing code for the new IA-64 architecture.

"...a timely and valuable book. It will appeal to those interested separately or jointly in IA-64 and the elementary math functions."
—William S. Worley, Jr., Distinguished Contributor, Hewlett-Packard Laboratories

In IA-64 and Elementary Functions: Speed and Precision, leading HP computer architect Dr. Peter Markstein introduces the IA-64 architecture and its breakthrough elementary math functions. This information—essential to the development of optimized IA-64 server applications and operating systems—was formerly available only in specialized journals, or not available at all.

Markstein first introduces the IA-64 architecture, the objectives that motivated its design, and the unique architectural features that can be exploited by developers of high-performance elementary function libraries, including software pipelining, instruction grouping, prefetching, predication, speculative execution, and explicit parallelism. He then introduces several techniques that lend themselves to software pipelining, which is exceptionally well supported by the IA-64 architecture and can lead to dramatic performance gains.

The book covers all major elementary functions, demonstrating how they can be implemented to deliver optimal IA-64 performance and accuracy. Among the functions covered: square root and division, which must be performed in software on the IA-64.

For professional computer scientists, system software developers, mathematicians, and anyone building high-performance IA-64 software, IA-64 and Elementary Functions: Speed and Precision will be absolutely indispensable.