Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!cis.ohio-state.edu!sei.cmu.edu!fs7.ece.cmu.edu!o.gp.cs.cmu.edu!zardoz.club.cc.cmu.edu!ddj From: ddj@zardoz.club.cc.cmu.edu (Doug DeJulio) Newsgroups: comp.sys.next Subject: Re: Parallel Make Message-ID: <1991Jun9.152606.12802@cs.cmu.edu> Date: 9 Jun 91 15:26:06 GMT References: Sender: netnews@cs.cmu.edu (USENET News Group Software) Distribution: comp Organization: Castle Anthrax, Pittsburgh Lines: 35 In article melling@cs.psu.edu (Michael D Mellinger) writes: > >Does anyone have a parallel make program running on the NeXT? I have >a lab full of NeXT's that I want to put to use :-). By my >calculations, the 040 NeXT runs a little more than 1/2 as fast as our >$10,000,000 IBM 3090 when compiling programs(compared standard C >programs). So, if I get two or three machines running together, I >should be in good shape. Yes and no. I compiled gnu-make, which has support for parallel compiles. When I use "gmake -j3" (do three jobs at the same time) combined with "cc -pipe" on my 20 meg NeXTstation, I get an average of a 20% speedup in compiles. Note that you have to be careful about writing your makefiles. You have to have your dependancies all mapped out. The order in which things are compiled can't be depended upon, beyond what's neccessitated by dependencies. I've seen too many makefiles from packages off the net that don't work when used with gnumake -j#, where # is greater than 1. Gnu-make has support for splitting the compile up among a cluster of machines, but since I only have one machine I didn't try to port this functionality to the NeXT (if somone wants to give me a second machine, I'll do it...). Note that the syntax used by gnu-make and the make provided by NeXT (basically CMU CS Make, I think) are different. They have some similar extensions, but the makefiles that take advantage of their extensions are incompatible between them. So, you can't use gnu-make on IB-generated makefiles. Yet. This one I might try to tackle this summer. "This looks like a job for Zilla!" -- Doug DeJulio dd26+@andrew.cmu.edu