Scout: High-Performance Heterogeneous Computing Made Simple

Researchers must often write their own simulation and analysis software. During this process they simultaneously confront both computational and scientific problems. Current strategies for aiding the generation of performance-oriented programs do not abstract the software development from the science. Furthermore, the problem is becoming increasingly complex and pressing with the continued development of many-core and heterogeneous (CPU-GPU) architectures. To achieve high performance, scientists must expertly navigate both software and hardware. Co-design between computer scientists and research scientists can alleviate but not solve this problem. The science community requires better tools for developing, optimizing, and future-proofing codes, allowing scientists to focus on their research while still achieving high computational performance. Scout is a parallel programming language and extensible compiler framework targeting heterogeneous architectures. It provides the abstraction required to buffer scientists from the constantly-shifting details of hardware while still realizing high-performance by encapsulating software and hardware optimization within a compiler framework.