Code Generation for Productive, Portable, and Scalable Finite Element Simulation in Firedrake

• Published in: Computing in science & engineering Vol. 23; no. 4; pp. 8 - 17
• Main Authors: Betteridge, Jack D., Farrell, Patrick E., Ham, David A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 01.07.2021; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Algorithms; Bandwidth; Computational modeling; Finite element method; Handheld computers; Mathematical model; Poisson equations; Python; Simulation; Software development; Supercomputers
• ISSN: 1521-9615; 1558-366X; 1558-366X
• DOI: 10.1109/MCSE.2021.3085102

Creating scalable, high-performance PDE-based simulations requires an appropriate combination of models, discretizations, and solvers. The required combination changes with the application and with the available hardware, yet software development time is a severely limited resource for most scientists and engineers. Here we demonstrate that generating simulation code from a high-level Python interface provides an effective mechanism for creating high-performance simulations from very few lines of user code. We demonstrate that moving from one supercomputer to another can require significant algorithmic changes to achieve scalable performance, but that the code generation approach enables these algorithmic changes to be achieved with minimal development effort.