Experiences with the C++ Standard Template Library and MPI for a Parallel Particle Simulation Method

In this paper we discuss design and implementation of a parallel particle simulation method from the realm of material sciences (laser ablation). To achieve a high degree of portability and eeciency we combine C++ and the MPI message passing library. Following a current trend in C++ towards template-based class libraries we use the Standard Template Library (STL). One of our results is that the STL is not only an easy library to use but a very eecient one too. Message passing libraries like MPI do not ooer proper STL bindings. We address these deeciencies and outline how both libraries could be joined smoothly. We also present performance measurements of our program on a cluster of 36 workstations. Using all nodes we can run a simulation that is almost 40 times larger than the original sequential one in less than one and half of the time the sequential simulation would require.