2 @mainpage SimGrid Reference Manual
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9 <img src="simgrid_logo_2011.png" alt="SimGrid - Scalable simulation of distributed systems, ranging from grids to peer-to-peer systems" />
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20 \section ref_guide_welcome SimGrid Reference Guide
22 Welcome to the SimGrid Reference Guide. This guide contains a detailed list of functions, macros and structs provided by SimGrid. This guide is supposed to help you to code your simulator using SimGrid primitives, so it means that you already know the basics of SimGrid, have it installed and so on. If not, please refer either to the SimGrid user guide or to the various tutorials available either online or in the relevant doc section.
24 \section a_quick_glance SimGrid ?
26 SimGrid is a toolkit that provides core functionalities for the simulation
27 of distributed applications in heterogeneous distributed environments.
29 The specific goal of the project is to facilitate research in the area of
30 distributed and parallel application scheduling on distributed computing
31 platforms ranging from simple network of workstations to Computational
35 - The official webpage is <a href="http://simgrid.gforge.inria.fr/">simgrid.gforge.inria.fr</a>.
36 - The Frequently Asked Questions are <a href="http://simgrid.gforge.inria.fr/faq.html">here</a>.
37 - The development webpage is <a href="https://gforge.inria.fr/projects/simgrid//">gforge.inria.fr/projects/simgrid</a>.
38 - The user mailing list is <simgrid-user@lists.gforge.inria.fr>
39 - The SimGrid software package can be downloaded from <a href="http://simgrid.gforge.inria.fr/download.php">here</a>.
44 \section overview Overview of the toolkit components
46 As depicted by the following diagram, the SimGrid toolkit is basically
47 three-layered (click on the picture to jump to a specific component).
53 \htmlinclude simgrid_modules.map
56 <br><b>Relationships between the SimGrid components (click to jump to API)</b>
60 \subsection overview_envs Programmation environments layer
62 SimGrid provides several programmation environments built on top of a unique
63 simulation kernel. Each environment targets a specific audiance and
64 constitutes a different paradigm. To choose which of them you want to use,
65 you have to think about what you want to do and what would be the result of
68 - If you want to study a theoritical problem and compare several
69 heuristics, you probably want to try <b>\ref MSG_API</b> (yet another
70 historical name). It was designed exactly to that extend and should allow
71 you to build easily rather realistic multi-agents simulation. Yet,
72 realism is not the main goal of this environment and the most annoying
73 technical issues of real platforms are masked here. Check the \ref
74 MSG_API section for more information.
76 - If you want to study the behaviour of a MPI application using emulation
77 technics, you should have a look at the <b>\ref SMPI_API</b> (Simulated
78 MPI) programming environment. Unfortunately, this work is still underway.
79 Check the \ref SMPI_API section for more information.
81 - If you want to develop a real distributed application, then you may find
82 <b>\ref GRAS_API</b> (Grid Reality And Simulation) useful. This is an API
83 for the realization of distributed applications.
85 Moreover, there is two implementations of this API: one on top of the
86 SURF (allowing to develop and test your application within the comfort of
87 the simulator) and another suited for deployment on real platforms
88 (allowing the resulting application to be highly portable and extremely
91 Even if you do not plan to run your code for real, you may want to switch
92 to GRAS if you intend to use MSG in a very intensive way (e.g. for
93 simulating a peer-to-peer environment).
95 See the \ref GRAS_API section for more details.
97 If your favorite programming environment/model is not there (BSP,
98 components, OpenMP, etc.) is not represented in the SimGrid toolkit yet, you may
99 consider adding it. You should contact us first on the
100 <a href=http://lists.gforge.inria.fr/mailman/listinfo/simgrid-devel>SimGrid
101 developers mailing list</a>, though.
103 \subsection overview_kernel Simulation kernel layer
105 The core functionnalities to simulate a virtual platform are provided by a
106 module called <b>\ref SURF_API</b>. It is
107 very low-level and is not intended to be used as such by end-users. Instead,
108 it serve as a basis for the higher level layer.
110 SURF main features are a fast max-min linear solver and the ability to
111 change transparently the model used to describe the platform. This greatly
112 eases the comparison of the several models existing in the litterature.
114 See the \ref SURF_API section for more details.
116 \subsection overview_fondation Base layer
118 The base of the whole toolkit is constituted by the <b>\ref XBT_API
119 (eXtended Bundle of Tools)</b>.
121 It is a portable library providing some grounding features such as \ref
122 XBT_log, \ref XBT_ex and \ref XBT_config. XBT also encompass
123 the following convenient datastructures: \ref XBT_dynar, \ref XBT_fifo, \ref
124 XBT_dict, \ref XBT_heap, \ref XBT_set and \ref XBT_swag.
126 See the \ref XBT_API section for more details.
129 \subsection lucas_layer Tracing simulation
130 Finally, a transversal module allows you to trace your simulation. More documentation in the section \ref TRACE_doc
134 The SimGrid software package can be downloaded from
135 <a href="http://simgrid.gforge.inria.fr/download.php">here</a>.<br>
137 If you are interested in the history of SimGrid and in current and planned development,
138 you can find out more <a href="http://simgrid.gforge.inria.fr/history.html">here</a>.
140 Any question, remark or suggestion are welcome on the
141 <a href="http://lists.gforge.inria.fr/mailman/listinfo/simgrid-user">SimGrid users
149 <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/LGPL/2.1/"><img alt="CC-GNU LGPL" border="0" src="http://creativecommons.org/images/public/cc-LGPL-a.png" /></a>