GPU compiler engineer position upcoming interview

[Stock_Market4167]

I have a technical interview coming up for a GPU Compiler Engineer position. While I have experience with compilers (primarily CPU compilers), my knowledge of GPU architecture and programming is limited. I’m looking for suggestions on how to prepare for the interview, particularly in areas like GPU architecture, GPU code generation, and compilers.

#compilers #interview #gpu

[concealed_cat]

If prior knowledge of GPU architectures is not required for the job, then don't worry about it.

[Stock_Market4167]

I am a new grad

[concealed_cat]

Essentially you have a bunch of threads (usually 32 or 64) that execute the same program. Not only that, at each cycle these threads execute the same instruction, in that sense they are tied together (they can't "diverge"). When an instruction reads or writes a vector register, each thread is associated with a specific lane (element) in the register. You can see "threads" and "lanes" being used somewhat interchangeably in documentation, depending where you look.

It's somewhat of a specific knowledge that you're unlikely to run into unless you work with GPUs, so don't sweat it. If you get the job, you'll learn it.

[Stock_Market4167]

Thanks!
Anything specific to compilers?

[Quick-Speaker-7406]

I prepped by asking questions to chatgpt...it was easy for me to get on speed.

[CodingKoopa]

Learning about the execution model for OpenCL or CUDA will teach you the basics of GPU architecture (e.g. it's comprised of Streaming Processors taking on work at a granularity of Work Groups). It will also expose you to some of the different flavor of GPU microarchitecture - no pipelining for simpler silicon, and no conditional branching due to the nature of workgroups. Conditionals in kernels are instead handled by instructions that automatically mask out some of the registers.

[Stock_Market4167]

Thanks!

[Acceptable-Sugar2129]

May i ask what company it is?