Parallel Computing

About Parallelism at Microsoft

A Q&A with S. Somasegar, Senior Vice President, Developer Division
“Microsoft’s goal is to make the benefits of building software on manycore architectures simple and accessible to the broad developer community.” Here S. Somasegar talks about the progress of Microsoft’s Parallel Computing Initiative and what to expect in Microsoft® Visual Studio® 2010.

Letter from Lynne Hill, General Manager, Parallel Computing Initiative
”The CTP of Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 will allow both native and managed developers to evaluate new parallel APIs that simplify parallel programming.” Here Lynne discusses the new parallel features available in the Community Technology Preview (CTP) of Microsoft Visual Studio 2010.

Taking Parallelism Mainstream: Parallel Technologies in Microsoft Visual Studio 2010
Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 leads the first wave of developer tools to simplify the mainstream transition to parallel software development. Learn about Microsoft’s approach to parallel computing and the parallel technologies available in Visual Studio 2010.

The Manycore Shift: Microsoft Parallel Computing Initiative Ushers Computing into the Next Era.
The computational power of manycore processors promises to change the way people will interact with computers. This paper describes how Microsoft and industry partners are working together to enable businesses, software and hardware vendors, and individuals to take advantage of the "manycore shift."

Featured Resources

Parallel Computing Session Videos at Microsoft's Professional Developer’s Conference

• Concurrency Analysis Platform (CAP) from Microsoft Research
• Parallel Programming for Managed Developers with the Next Version of Microsoft Visual Studio
• Concurrency Runtime Deep Dive: How to Harvest Multicore Computing Resources
• Parallel Symposium: Future of Parallel Computing
• Parallel Symposium: Application Opportunities and Architectures
• Parallel Symposium: Addressing the Hard Problems with Concurrency
• Microsoft Visual Studio: Bringing out the Best in Multicore Systems
• Parallel Programming for C++ Developers in the Next Version of Microsoft Visual Studio

Downloads

Evaluate Parallel APIs in the Community Technology Preview of Microsoft Visual Studio 2010
The CTP includes .NET Framework libraries such as the Task Parallel Library (TPL) and Parallel LINQ (PLINQ), as well as the Parallel Pattern Library (PPL) and Concurrency Runtime for developing native applications with C++, and parallel profiling and debugging tools.

This CTP is available for download as a Virtual PC image. Virtual PC supports only one core; a user will likely not see significant parallel performance benefits on manycore machines. However, third party tools are available for converting a Virtual PC image to a Hyper-V image. Support for the CTP of Visual Studio 2010 is provided on MSDN Forums, where the community of developers helps answer questions. Microsoft does not support third party tools for converting a Virtual PC image to a Hyper-V image.