What is PARSEC ?

The Princeton Application Repository for Shared-Memory Computers (PARSEC) is a benchmark suite composed of multithreaded programs. The suite focuses on emerging workloads and was designed to be representative of next-generation shared-memory programs for chip-multiprocessors.

Getting started

  • Download the PARSEC release 3.0 from here the site

  • Download the tutorial for parsec-3.0 from here or refer to the wiki one. The pdf tutorial seems to be hidden off in some corner of the website unfortunately.

  • Source the env by going into the parsec root directory. 
    source env.sh
  • Build all the apps that can be benchmarked 
    parsecmgmt -a build -p all -c gcc

Issues faced

Here are some of the links which helped me solve the issues.

The first link is very detailed, please go through that first to check if you encounter any of the above issues. Other than those issues, I have listed the ones I faced.

1) Issue with C++ version

In file included from /home/qfettes/benchmarks/parsec/parsec-2.1/./pkgs/apps/bodytrack/src/TrackingBenchmark/threads/WorkerGroup.cpp:17:0:
/home/qfettes/benchmarks/parsec/parsec-2.1/./pkgs/apps/bodytrack/src/TrackingBenchmark/threads/WorkerGroup.h:88:5: error: looser throw specifier for 'virtual threads::WorkerGroup::~WorkerGroup() throw (threads::CondException, threads::MutexException)'
     ~WorkerGroup();
     ^
In file included from /home/qfettes/benchmarks/parsec/parsec-2.1/./pkgs/apps/bodytrack/src/TrackingBenchmark/threads/WorkerGroup.h:18:0,
                 from /home/qfettes/benchmarks/parsec/parsec-2.1/./pkgs/apps/bodytrack/src/TrackingBenchmark/threads/WorkerGroup.cpp:17:
/home/qfettes/benchmarks/parsec/parsec-2.1/./pkgs/apps/bodytrack/src/TrackingBenchmark/threads/Thread.h:31:13: error:   overriding 'virtual threads::Runnable::~Runnable() noexcept'
     virtual ~Runnable() {};

Solution: Add -std=c++11 to the line export CXXFLAGS in the file config/gcc.bldconf

export CXXFLAGS="-O3 -g -funroll-loops -fprefetch-loop-arrays -fpermissive -fno-exceptions ${PORTABILITY_FLAGS} -std=c++11"

2) Issue with compiling x264

/usr/bin/ld: libx264.a(cabac-a.o): relocation R_X86_64_32 against symbol x264_cabac_range_lps' can not be used when making a shared object; recompile with -fPIC /usr/bin/ld: libx264.a(quant-a.o): relocation R_X86_64_32 against hidden symbolx264_pb_01' can not be used when making a shared object
/usr/bin/ld: libx264.a(dct-a.o): relocation R_X86_64_32 against hidden symbol x264_pw_8000' can not be used when making a shared object /usr/bin/ld: libx264.a(deblock-a.o): relocation R_X86_64_32 against hidden symbolx264_pb_1' can not be used when making a shared object
/usr/bin/ld: libx264.a(mc-a.o): relocation R_X86_64_32 against hidden symbol x264_pw_64' can not be used when making a shared object /usr/bin/ld: libx264.a(mc-a2.o): relocation R_X86_64_32 against hidden symbolx264_pw_32' can not be used when making a shared object

Solution: The problem here is that we need to enable fPIC in the configure step. Add --enable-pic to build_conf in the file pkgs/apps/x264/parsec/gcc-pthreads.bldconf

build_conf="--enable-pthread --enable-pic --extra-asflags=\"${ASFLAGS}\" --extra-cflags=\"${CFLAGS}\" --extra-ldflags=\"${LDFLAGS} ${LIBS}\""