Using Parallel Root Grid IO¶

First, read Parallel Root Grid IO. Come back when you’re finished.

Parallel root grid IO (PRGIO) is necessary when initializing problems that don’t fit in memory on one machine. A PRGIO problem generator needs to function in two passes. First it needs to set up the basic problem (see Calling the Grid Initializer: Unigrid) without allocating any data. This will create a temporary root grid that covers the entire domain. Then CommunicationPartitionGrid splits this grid into several pieces. Usually there is one partition per MPI process unless the parameter NumberOfRootGridTilesPerDimensionPerProcessor is greater than 1. The temporary root grid is then deleted, leaving only the empty level-0 grids. Finally each processor re-initializes the newly created subgrids, this time allocating the data only when the grid belongs to it, i.e. MyProcessorNumber == ProcessorNumber. Both passes are done in InitializeNew.C.

For an example, see either the

  • CosmologySimulationInitialize and CosmologySimulationReInitialize
  • TurbulenceSimulationInitialize and TurbulenceSimulationReInitialize

routines in InitializeNew.C.