Research issues for executing real-time C3 applications on parallel processing systems

Current trends indicate that future C3 (command, control, and communications) systems will likely contain suites of heterogeneous computing facilities composed of both parallel and sequential computing components. Also, `commercial-off-the-shelf´ components are being heavily considered for use in these future systems. In the context of these trends, brief overviews of related work within the areas of parallel processing and real-time computing are given and areas of future research are outlined. A central theme throughout the paper is that in order to make effective use of future C3 platforms, a significant amount of `cross fertilization´ between researchers in the parallel processing and real-time computing communities will be required. As an example of the need for combined expertise in both areas, the problem of how to effectively allocate real-time tasks onto the processing elements of a hypercube architecture is discussed. Other research issues, including the question of how to cope with the degree of nondeterminism present in many commercial parallel processing systems, are also discussed