Consistency in dataflow graphs
Lee, E.A.
Dept. of Electr. Eng. & Comput. Sci., California Univ., Berkeley, CA;
This paper appears in: Parallel and Distributed Systems, IEEE Transactions on
Publication Date: Apr 1991
Volume: 2,
Issue: 2
On page(s): 223-235
ISSN: 1045-9219
References Cited: 27
CODEN: ITDSEO
INSPEC Accession Number: 3963682
Digital Object Identifier: 10.1109/71.89067
Current Version Published: 2002-08-06
Abstract
Analytical properties of programming languages with dataflow graph
semantics are discussed. It is shown that one of the most serious
problems with these languages is that subtle inconsistencies between
parts of the dataflow graph can be inadvertently created. These
inconsistencies can lead to deadlock, or in the case of nonterminating
programs, to unbounded memory requirements. Consistency is defined to
mean that the same number of tokens is consumed as produced on any arc,
in the long run. A token-flow model is developed for testing for
inconsistency. The method is a generalization of consistency checks for
synchronous dataflow (SDF) graphs. The token-flow model is compared to
similar tests applied to hybrid dynamical systems. It is argued that
dataflow semantics make steady-state analysis possible, leading to a
simpler method in most cases
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