A Comparison of Hardware and Software Associative
Memories in the Context of Computer Graphics

The Associative Processing of Line Drawings (APLD)
System utilizes a hardware associative memory 
and creates, modifies, deletes, stores, and retrieves
two-dimensional line drawings consisting of poin ts,
lines, rectangles, and triangles. The APLD functions
were duplicated on the TX-2 computer at M.'s 
Lincoln Laboratory under the LEAP Language and Data
Structure,  A comparison of the hardware approach 
with the software simulation illustrates the advantages
of the hardware associative memory in three areas: 
(1) processing speed, (2) storage requirements, and (3)
flexibility.  The major problem areas of hardware 
associative memory technology, namely input/output
and cost effectiveness, are also addressed.

CACM May, 1977

Stillman, N. J.
Berra, P. B.

associative memory, associative processor, content-addressable
memory, graphics, information retrieval, 
data structures, software evaluation, hardware evaluation,
parallel processing, database management

3.71 3.72 3.73 3.74 4.34 4.6 6.22 8.2

CA770505 JB December 29, 1977  2:07 AM

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