RE: [Swarm-Modelling] True concurrency?

[North, Michael]

As a quick note, Repast supports both simulated and true concurrency.  Repast’s simulated concurrency works the way you outlined below.  True concurrency (i.e., parallel execution) can be achieved using the Repast scheduler methods with “duration” parameters.  Setting non-zero durations will cause the scheduler to concurrently execute tasks that have overlapping time durations.  If you have multiple CPUs available then the tasks will execute in true parallel form on multiple CPUs.  The Repast scheduler uses thread pooling to make this efficient.  Of course, model developers are responsible for making sure that true parallel execution makes sense for their model.  This generally means that the model needs to be thread safe.

 

Mike

 

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From: address@hidden [mailto:address@hidden On Behalf Of Valmir Meneses
Sent: Tuesday, August 30, 2005 4:55 PM
To: address@hidden
Subject: [Swarm-Modelling] True concurrency?

 

 

Hi,

Is Swarm concurrent (agents run concurrently) or implements threaded schedules like "swarm-alike" Repast?

A bit more detailed. Repast runs the agent action within a schedule. At some tick, the agent list is scanned and each agent is given attention. But, as far as I know, the agents do not run concurrently. Within each tick, the agents are chosen randomly to determine who will have attention. Repast implements "simulated concurrency".

Since Repast claims to be based in Swarm, I wonder what is the Swarm behaviour?

Thanks for your help,