Lecture 24: Critical Thinking. Code Optimization Aspects.
Lecture Summary
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Parallel computing, multi-core: how caches come into play
Critical thinking, and similar tricks for speeding up your code
Today
Critical thinking, and other similar tricks for speeding up your code
Know your hardware
Choose the right algorithm
When working on a problem, there's more to performance than asymptotic complexity
Because asymptotic complexity is most often defined by the number of operations
Memory transactions are rarely considered: they are specific to the hardware
Assess the arithmetic intensity associated with your problem
Simple optimization: Fusing transformations and do not bring data into the cache twice
Compiler
Aggressive optimizations done by the compiler might change the behavior of your code
To help the compiler:
Allow it to see as much code as possible
Provide flags to convey information (e.g., the target architecture)
There are a lot of amazing things covered in this lecture. The takeaways are:
Compilers are fantastic
Know them better to use them wisely
A quick example is down below. Refer to the slides for a lot more fun facts
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