xref: /libCEED/README.md (revision 330b45c247c260984f32dd163bf10c1bf26c0bad)
1# libCEED: the CEED API Library
2
3[![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/CEED/libCEED.svg?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/CEED/libCEED)
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5[![License](https://img.shields.io/badge/License-BSD%202--Clause-orange.svg)](https://opensource.org/licenses/BSD-2-Clause)
6[![Doxygen](https://codedocs.xyz/CEED/libCEED.svg)](https://codedocs.xyz/CEED/libCEED/)
7
8## Code for Efficient Extensible Discretization
9
10This repository contains an initial low-level API library for the efficient
11high-order discretization methods developed by the ECP co-design [Center for
12Efficient Exascale Discretizations (CEED)](http://ceed.exascaleproject.org).
13While our focus is on high-order finite elements, the approach is mostly
14algebraic and thus applicable to other discretizations in factored form, as
15explained in the API documentation portion of the [Doxygen documentation](https://codedocs.xyz/CEED/libCEED/md_doc_libCEEDapi.html).
16
17One of the challenges with high-order methods is that a global sparse matrix is
18no longer a good representation of a high-order linear operator, both with
19respect to the FLOPs needed for its evaluation, as well as the memory transfer
20needed for a matvec.  Thus, high-order methods require a new "format" that still
21represents a linear (or more generally non-linear) operator, but not through a
22sparse matrix.
23
24The goal of libCEED is to propose such a format, as well as supporting
25implementations and data structures, that enable efficient operator evaluation
26on a variety of computational device types (CPUs, GPUs, etc.). This new operator
27description is based on algebraically [factored form](https://codedocs.xyz/CEED/libCEED/md_doc_libCEEDapi.html),
28which is easy to incorporate in a wide variety of applications, without significant
29refactoring of their own discretization infrastructure.
30
31The repository is part of the [CEED software suite][ceed-soft], a collection of
32software benchmarks, miniapps, libraries and APIs for efficient exascale
33discretizations based on high-order finite element and spectral element methods.
34See http://github.com/ceed for more information and source code availability.
35
36The CEED research is supported by the [Exascale Computing Project][ecp]
37(17-SC-20-SC), a collaborative effort of two U.S. Department of Energy
38organizations (Office of Science and the National Nuclear Security
39Administration) responsible for the planning and preparation of a [capable
40exascale ecosystem](https://exascaleproject.org/what-is-exascale), including
41software, applications, hardware, advanced system engineering and early testbed
42platforms, in support of the nation’s exascale computing imperative.
43
44For more details on the CEED API see http://ceed.exascaleproject.org/ceed-code/.
45
46## Building
47
48The CEED library, `libceed`, is a C99 library with no external dependencies.  It
49can be built using
50
51    make
52
53or, with optimization flags
54
55    make OPT='-O3 -march=skylake-avx512 -ffp-contract=fast'
56
57These optimization flags are used by all languages (C, C++, Fortran) and this
58makefile variable can also be set for testing and examples (below).
59
60The library attempts to automatically detect support for the AVX
61instruction set using gcc-style compiler options for the host.
62Support may need to be manually specified via
63
64    make AVX=1
65
66or
67
68    make AVX=0
69
70if your compiler does not support gcc-style options, if you are cross
71compiling, etc.
72
73## Testing
74
75The test suite produces [TAP](https://testanything.org) output and is run by:
76
77    make test
78
79or, using the `prove` tool distributed with Perl (recommended)
80
81    make prove
82
83## Backends
84
85There are multiple supported backends, which can be selected at runtime in the examples:
86
87|  CEED resource           | Backend                                           |
88| :----------------------- | :------------------------------------------------ |
89| `/cpu/self/ref/serial`   | Serial reference implementation                   |
90| `/cpu/self/ref/blocked`  | Blocked refrence implementation                   |
91| `/cpu/self/tmpl`         | Backend template, delegates to `/cpu/self/ref/blocked` |
92| `/cpu/self/avx/serial`   | Serial AVX implementation                         |
93| `/cpu/self/avx/blocked`  | Blocked AVX implementation                        |
94| `/cpu/self/xsmm/serial`  | Serial LIBXSMM implementation                     |
95| `/cpu/self/xsmm/blocked` | Blocked LIBXSMM implementation                    |
96| `/cpu/occa`              | Serial OCCA kernels                               |
97| `/gpu/occa`              | CUDA OCCA kernels                                 |
98| `/omp/occa`              | OpenMP OCCA kernels                               |
99| `/ocl/occa`              | OpenCL OCCA kernels                               |
100| `/gpu/cuda/ref`          | Reference pure CUDA kernels                       |
101| `/gpu/cuda/reg`          | Pure CUDA kernels using one thread per element    |
102| `/gpu/magma`             | CUDA MAGMA kernels                                |
103
104
105The `/cpu/self/*/serial` backends process one element at a time and are intended for meshes
106with a smaller number of high order elements. The `/cpu/self/*/blocked` backends process
107blocked batches of eight interlaced elements and are intended for meshes with higher numbers
108of elements.
109
110The `/cpu/self/ref/*` backends are written in pure C and provide basic functionality.
111
112The `/cpu/self/avx/*` backends rely upon AVX instructions to provide vectorized CPU performance.
113
114The `/cpu/self/xsmm/*` backends rely upon the [LIBXSMM](http://github.com/hfp/libxsmm) package
115to provide vectorized CPU performance.
116
117The `/*/occa` backends rely upon the [OCCA](http://github.com/libocca/occa) package to provide
118cross platform performance.
119
120The `/gpu/cuda/*` backends provide GPU performance strictly using CUDA.
121
122The `/gpu/magma` backend relies upon the [MAGMA](https://bitbucket.org/icl/magma) package.
123
124## Examples
125
126libCEED comes with several examples of its usage, ranging from standalone C
127codes in the `/examples/ceed` directory to examples based on external packages,
128such as MFEM, PETSc, and Nek5000. Nek5000 v18.0 or greater is required.
129
130To build the examples, set the `MFEM_DIR`, `PETSC_DIR` and `NEK5K_DIR` variables
131and run:
132
133```console
134# libCEED examples on CPU and GPU
135cd examples/ceed
136make
137./ex1 -ceed /cpu/self
138./ex1 -ceed /gpu/occa
139cd ../..
140
141# MFEM+libCEED examples on CPU and GPU
142cd examples/mfem
143make
144./bp1 -ceed /cpu/self -no-vis
145./bp1 -ceed /gpu/occa -no-vis
146cd ../..
147
148# PETSc+libCEED examples on CPU and GPU
149cd examples/petsc
150make
151./bp1 -ceed /cpu/self
152./bp1 -ceed /gpu/occa
153cd ../..
154
155# Nek+libCEED examples on CPU and GPU
156cd examples/nek5000
157./make-nek-examples.sh
158./run-nek-example.sh -ceed /cpu/self -b 3
159./run-nek-example.sh -ceed /gpu/occa -b 3
160cd ../..
161```
162
163The above code assumes a GPU-capable machine with the OCCA backend
164enabled. Depending on the available backends, other Ceed resource specifiers can
165be provided with the `-ceed` option.
166
167## Benchmarks
168
169A sequence of benchmarks for all enabled backends can be run using
170
171```console
172make benchmarks
173```
174
175The results from the benchmarks are stored inside the `benchmarks/` directory
176and they can be viewed using the commands (requires python with matplotlib):
177
178```console
179cd benchmarks
180python postprocess-plot.py petsc-bp1-*-output.txt
181python postprocess-plot.py petsc-bp3-*-output.txt
182```
183
184Using the `benchmarks` target runs a comprehensive set of benchmarks which may
185take some time to run. Subsets of the benchmarks can be run using targets such
186as `make bench-petsc-bp1`, or `make bench-petsc-bp3`.
187
188For more details about the benchmarks, see
189[`benchmarks/README.md`](benchmarks/README.md)
190
191
192## Install
193
194To install libCEED, run
195
196    make install prefix=/usr/local
197
198or (e.g., if creating packages),
199
200    make install prefix=/usr DESTDIR=/packaging/path
201
202Note that along with the library, libCEED installs kernel sources, e.g. OCCA
203kernels are installed in `$prefix/lib/okl`. This allows the OCCA backend to
204build specialized kernels at run-time. In a normal setting, the kernel sources
205will be found automatically (relative to the library file `libceed.so`).
206However, if that fails (e.g. if `libceed.so` is moved), one can copy (cache) the
207kernel sources inside the user OCCA directory, `~/.occa` using
208
209    $(OCCA_DIR)/bin/occa cache ceed $(CEED_DIR)/lib/okl/*.okl
210
211This will allow OCCA to find the sources regardless of the location of the CEED
212library. One may occasionally need to clear the OCCA cache, which can be accomplished
213by removing the `~/.occa` directory or by calling `$(OCCA_DIR)/bin/occa clear -a`.
214
215### pkg-config
216
217In addition to library and header, libCEED provides a [pkg-config][pkg-config1]
218file that can be used to easily compile and link. [For example][pkg-config2], if
219`$prefix` is a standard location or you set the environment variable
220`PKG_CONFIG_PATH`,
221
222    cc `pkg-config --cflags --libs ceed` -o myapp myapp.c
223
224will build `myapp` with libCEED.  This can be used with the source or
225installed directories.  Most build systems have support for pkg-config.
226
227## Contact
228
229You can reach the libCEED team by emailing [ceed-users@llnl.gov](mailto:ceed-users@llnl.gov)
230or by leaving a comment in the [issue tracker](https://github.com/CEED/libCEED/issues).
231
232## Copyright
233
234The following copyright applies to each file in the CEED software suite, unless
235otherwise stated in the file:
236
237> Copyright (c) 2017, Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC. Produced at the
238> Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. LLNL-CODE-734707. All Rights reserved.
239
240See files LICENSE and NOTICE for details.
241
242[ceed-soft]:   http://ceed.exascaleproject.org/software/
243[ecp]:         https://exascaleproject.org/exascale-computing-project
244[pkg-config1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pkg-config
245[pkg-config2]: https://people.freedesktop.org/~dbn/pkg-config-guide.html#faq
246