Gossiping on meshes and tori

Algorithms for performing gossiping on one- and higher-dimensional meshes are presented. As a routing model, the practically important wormhole routing is assumed. We especially focus on the trade-off between the start-up time and the transmission time. For one-dimensional arrays and rings, we give a novel lower bound and an asymptotically optimal gossiping algorithm for all choices of the parameters involved. For two-dimensional meshes and tori, a simple algorithm composed of one-dimensional phases is presented. For an important range of packet and mesh sizes, it gives clear improvements upon previously developed algorithms. The algorithm is analyzed theoretically and the achieved improvements are also convincingly demonstrated by simulations, as well as an implementation on the Paragon. On the Paragon, our algorithm even outperforms the gossiping routine provided in the NX message-passing library. For higher-dimensional meshes, we give algorithms which are based on an interesting generalization of the notion of a diagonal. These algorithms are analyzed theoretically, as well as by simulation.