A hybrid scheme for processing data structures in a dataflowenvironment

The asynchronous nature of the dataflow model of computation allows the exploitation of maximum inherent parallelism in many application programs. However, before the dataflow model of computation can become a viable alternative to the control flow model of computation, one has to find practical solutions to some problems such as efficient handling of data structures. The paper introduces a new model for handling data structures in a dataflow environment. The proposed model combines constant time access capabilities of vectors as well as the flexibility inherent in the concept of pointers. This allows a careful balance between copying and sharing to optimize the storage and processing overhead incurred during the operations on data structures. The mode] is compared by simulation to other data structure models proposed in the literature, and the results are good