Parallel Computing

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What Does Parallel Computing Mean?

Parallel computing is a type of computing architecture in which several processors execute or process an application or computation simultaneously. Parallel computing helps in performing large computations by dividing the workload between more than one processor, all of which work through the computation at the same time. Most supercomputers employ parallel computing principles to operate.

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Parallel computing is also known as parallel processing.

Techopedia Explains Parallel Computing

Parallel processing is generally implemented in operational environments/scenarios that require massive computation or processing power. The primary objective of parallel computing is to increase the available computation power for faster application processing or task resolution. Typically, parallel computing infrastructure is housed within a single facility where many processors are installed in a server rack or separate servers are connected together. The application server sends a computation or processing request that is distributed in small chunks or components, which are concurrently executed on each processor/server. Parallel computation can be classified as bit-level, instructional level, data and task parallelism.

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Margaret Rouse
Technology expert
Margaret Rouse
Technology expert

Margaret is an award-winning writer and educator known for her ability to explain complex technical topics to a non-technical business audience. Over the past twenty years, her IT definitions have been published by Que in an encyclopedia of technology terms and cited in articles in the New York Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, ZDNet, PC Magazine, and Discovery Magazine. She joined Techopedia in 2011. Margaret’s idea of ​​a fun day is to help IT and business professionals to learn to speak each other’s highly specialized languages.