Commands which have been made multi threaded in NX
Commands which have been made multi threaded in NX
(OP)
Hi All,
Need to know whether in NX8 any commands have been made multi threaded . We have systems with multi core, but when you observe, NX 6.0.5 uses only single core for executing the commands.. It would help to know if Siemen`s have any initiative to move all the commands in NX to Multi Core/ Threaded functionality , so that they could executed faster..
Right now, Iam looking for list of commands , which are turned into multi thread/ core functionality as Siemen`s have replaced the parasolid kernel to 24 . I have read they have made some significant changes in version 23 of parasolid kernel.
Thanks for the inputs in advance
Need to know whether in NX8 any commands have been made multi threaded . We have systems with multi core, but when you observe, NX 6.0.5 uses only single core for executing the commands.. It would help to know if Siemen`s have any initiative to move all the commands in NX to Multi Core/ Threaded functionality , so that they could executed faster..
Right now, Iam looking for list of commands , which are turned into multi thread/ core functionality as Siemen`s have replaced the parasolid kernel to 24 . I have read they have made some significant changes in version 23 of parasolid kernel.
Thanks for the inputs in advance





RE: Commands which have been made multi threaded in NX
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Symmetric Multiprocessing (SMP) is supported in NX mostly via Parasolid, although a small number of NX capabilities have some threading. In general, it is not possible to quote a figure for the general performance improvement achieved by using SMP, since this improvement depends on the nature of the operations you are performing. You need to evaluate your actual performance gains using your own models. Functional areas that are SMP enabled in Parasolid include:
Validity checking
Boolean operations
Wireframe
Rendering
Hidden line rendering
Closest approach
Faceting
Mass properties
SMP is enabled by default with the variable UGII_SMP_ENABLE, which is located in the ugii_env_ug.dat file.
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You will find that it is not enabled by default but needs to be turned on by setting that variable with a value of 1.
Anthony Galante

Technical Resource Coordinator
NX4.0.4MP10, NX5.0.0->5.0.6, NX6.0.0->NX6.0.5, NX7.0.0->NX7.0.1 & NX7.5.0.32-> NX7.5.4.4, NX8.0.0.25
RE: Commands which have been made multi threaded in NX
With that in mind, you will understand why we've taken the approach that we have, first looking at Parasolid where it happens, as listed in Tony's reply above, there were some selected places where we could re-engineer the code to leverage multiple processors and we did so and we will continue to look for opportunities in Parasolid to do more of this, but don't expect anything all that dramatic since, contrary to what many people think, a lot of what happens in a product like NX, doesn't lend itself to muti-threading in the first place, PERIOD. The math just doesn't lend itself. However, we do look for 'low-hanging fruit' as it were and so, in addition to what our long term plans are for kernels like Parasolid, we sometimes find opportunities in NX itself, which are not always mentioned in the release notes, at least not with respect to their 'multi-threaded' nature.
For example, the built-in Movie 'capture' functionality we added in NX 6.0 is multi-threaded. Some work has recently been done by the CAM group to offer some multi-threading support with certain toolpath generation tasks. There's an option in the...
Preferences -> Visualization Performance -> Large Models
...where in the Settings section of the dialog you can enable an option labeled 'Background Loading' which will separate the processes of opening the part file and loading the actually graphic data into separate threads so that you can start to select menu items and functions even if the part file which you just opened has not yet been fully displayed, something which could be useful when working with very large assemblies.
Anyway, we will continue to look for places where we can leverage 'threading' when practical and where the cost can be justified, but it will be opportunity driven rather than as part of some ongoing, larger "let's work on making all of NX multi-threaded" project.
I hope this helps people understand what's happening and how they will likely see progress in the furture; a little here, a little there, but nothing earthshattering
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA
http://www.siemens.com/plm
UG/NX Museum: http://www.plmworld.org/p/cm/ld/fid=209
To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.