Modern processor architectures have embraced parallelism as an important pathway to increased
performance. Facing technical challenges with higher clock speeds in a fixed power envelope,
Central Processing Units (CPUs) now improve performance by adding multiple cores. Graphics
Processing Units (GPUs) have also evolved from fixed function rendering devices into
programmable parallel processors. As today’s computer systems often include highly parallel
CPUs, GPUs and other types of processors, it is important to enable software developers to take
full advantage of these heterogeneous processing platforms.
