Accuracy bugs: A new class of concurrency bugs to exploit algorithmic noise tolerance

Ismail Akturk, Riad Akram, Mohammad Majharul Islam, Abdullah Muzahid, Ulya Karpuzcu

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

Parallel programming introduces notoriously difficult bugs, usually referred to as concurrency bugs. This article investigates the potential for deviating from the conventional wisdom of writing concurrency bug-free, parallel programs. It explores the benefit of accepting buggy but approximately correct parallel programs by leveraging the inherent tolerance of emerging parallel applications to inaccuracy in computations. Under algorithmic noise tolerance, a new class of concurrency bugs, accuracy bugs, degrade the accuracy of computation (often at acceptable levels) rather than causing catastrophic termination. This study demonstrates how embracing accuracy bugs affects the application output quality and performance and analyzes the impact on execution semantics.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article number48
JournalACM Transactions on Architecture and Code Optimization
Volume13
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - Dec 2016

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This work is a new article, not an extention of a conference paper. The work was supported by the NSF under grant XPS: CCA:1438286 and CCF: SHF 1319983.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 ACM.

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