I don't know how to optimize cache performance at a really low level, thinking about cache-line size or associativity. That's not something you can learn overnight. Considering my program will run on many different systems and architectures, I don't think it would be worth it anyway. But still, there are probably some steps I can take to reduce cache misses in general.
Here is a description of my problem:
I have a 3d array of integers, representing values at points in space, like [x][y][z]. Each dimension is the same size, so it's like a cube. From that I need to make another 3d array, where each value in this new array is a function of 7 parameters: the corresponding value in the original 3d array, plus the 6 indices that "touch" it in space. I'm not worried about the edges and corners of the cube for now.
Here is what I mean in C++ code:
void process3DArray (int input[LENGTH][LENGTH][LENGTH],
int output[LENGTH][LENGTH][LENGTH])
{
for(int i = 1; i < LENGTH-1; i++)
for (int j = 1; j < LENGTH-1; j++)
for (int k = 1; k < LENGTH-1; k++)
//The for loops start at 1 and stop before LENGTH-1
//or other-wise I'll get out-of-bounds errors
//I'm not concerned with the edges and corners of the
//3d array "cube" at the moment.
{
int value = input[i][j][k];
//I am expecting crazy cache misses here:
int posX = input[i+1] [j] [k];
int negX = input[i-1] [j] [k];
int posY = input[i] [j+1] [k];
int negY = input[i] [j-1] [k];
int posZ = input[i] [j] [k+1];
int negZ = input[i] [j] [k-1];
output [i][j][k] =
process(value, posX, negX, posY, negY, posZ, negZ);
}
}
However, it seems like if LENGTH is large enough, I'll get tons of cache misses when I'm fetching the parameters for process
. Is there a cache-friendlier way to do this, or a better way to represent my data other than a 3d array?
And if you have the time to answer these extra questions, do I have to consider the value of LENGTH? Like it's different whether LENGTH is 20 vs 100 vs 10000. Also, would I have to do something else if I used something other than integers, like maybe a 64-byte struct?
@ ildjarn:
Sorry, I did not think that the code that generates the arrays I am passing into process3DArray
mattered. But if it does, I would like to know why.
int main() {
int data[LENGTH][LENGTH][LENGTH];
for(int i = 0; i < LENGTH; i++)
for (int j = 0; j < LENGTH; j++)
for (int k = 0; k < LENGTH; k++)
data[i][j][k] = rand() * (i + j + k);
int result[LENGTH][LENGTH][LENGTH];
process3DArray(data, result);
}