The Use of Queues in the Parallel Data Flow Evaluation of "If-Then-While" Programs

Abstract

A property of a model of parallel computation is analyzed. We show that the use of queues may speed-up the execution of well formed data flow schemas by an arbitrarily large factor. A general model of data flow computation is presented to provide a framework for the comparison of data flow models. In particular a formal definition of a data flow version of the Computation Graphs of Karp and Miller and the Data Flow Schemas of Dennis are provided within the context of this model.