Task Capable Components

by Steve Baer and Scott Davidson (Last updated:  Wednesday, June 30, 2021)

Overview

Grasshopper for Rhino allows you to develop multi-threaded components by way of the new IGH_TaskCapableComponent interface. Benchmarks have shown that Grasshopper can run significantly faster when using multi-threaded components. Results may vary, as not all solutions can be computed in parallel.

The Interface

When a component implements the IGH_TaskCapableComponent interface, Grasshopper will notice and potentially call a full enumeration of SolveInstance for the component twice in consecutive passes:

  1. The first pass is for collecting data and starting tasks to compute results
  2. The second pass is for using the results from the tasks to set outputs.

Example

In this guide, we will convert a standard component into a task capable component. In our example, the initial component code looks like this:

public class FibonacciComponent : GH_Component
{
  ...
  protected override void SolveInstance(IGH_DataAccess data)
  {
    const int max_steps = 46;
 
    int steps = 0;
    data.GetData(0, ref steps);
    if (steps < 0)
    {
      AddRuntimeMessage(GH_RuntimeMessageLevel.Error, "Steps must be >= 0.");
      return;
    }
    if (steps > max_steps) // Prevent overflow...
    {
      AddRuntimeMessage(GH_RuntimeMessageLevel.Error, $"Steps must be <= {max_steps}.");
      return;
    }
 
    int result;
    if (steps == 0)
      result = 0;
    else if (steps == 1)
      result = 1;
    else
    {
      int x = 0, y = 1, rc = 0;
      for (int i = 2; i <= steps; i++)
      {
        rc = x + y;
        x = y;
        y = rc;
      }
      result = rc;
    }
 
    data.SetData(0, result);
  }
  ...  
}

Separate Methods

Now you need to separate calculations into separate methods. Independent tasks should not be directly accessing IGH_DataAccess, as that interface is not thread safe. Thus, the we will want to break the current flow of a component’s SolveInstance method into three distinct steps:

  1. Collect input data
  2. Compute results on given data
  3. Set output data

To implement Step 2, we will break out the computation code into its own method.

To start, create a public SolveResults class to hold the data for each SolveInstance iteration. For this computation, our definition of SolveInstance is very simple:

public class SolveResults
{
  public int Value { get; set; }
}

Create a Compute function that takes the input retrieved from IGH_DataAccess and returns an instance of SolveResults.

private static SolveResults ComputeFibonacci(int n)
{
  SolveResults result = new SolveResults();
  if (n == 0)
    result.Value = 0;
  else if (n == 1)
    result.Value = 1;
  else
  {
    int x = 0, y = 1, rc = 0;
    for (int i = 2; i <= n; i++)
    {
      rc = x + y;
      x = y;
      y = rc;
    }
    result.Value = rc;
  }
  return result;
}

Implement the Interface

Now, we are ready to launch multiple tasks in the component.

Change the component’s inheritance from GH_Component to GH_TaskCapableComponent<T>. In this example, modify the component from this:

public class FibonacciComponent : GH_Component

to this:

public class FibonacciComponent : GH_TaskCapableComponent<FibonacciComponent.SolveResults>

Finally, modify SolveInstance to use tasks:

protected override void SolveInstance(IGH_DataAccess data)
{
  const int max_steps = 46;
 
  if (InPreSolve)
  {
    // First pass; collect input data
    int steps = 0;
    data.GetData(0, ref steps);
    if (steps < 0)
    {
      AddRuntimeMessage(GH_RuntimeMessageLevel.Error, "Steps must be >= 0.");
      return;
    }
    if (steps > max_steps) // Prevent overflow...
    {
      AddRuntimeMessage(GH_RuntimeMessageLevel.Error, $"Steps must be <= {max_steps}.");
      return;
    }
 
    // Queue up the task
    Task<SolveResults> task = Task.Run(() => ComputeFibonacci(steps), CancelToken);
    TaskList.Add(task);
    return;
  }
 
  if (!GetSolveResults(data, out SolveResults result))
  {
    // Compute right here; collect input data
    int steps = 0;
    data.GetData(0, ref steps);
    if (steps < 0)
    {
      AddRuntimeMessage(GH_RuntimeMessageLevel.Error, "Steps must be >= 0.");
      return;
    }
    if (steps > max_steps) // Prevent overflow...
    {
      AddRuntimeMessage(GH_RuntimeMessageLevel.Error, $"Steps must be <= {max_steps}.");
      return;
    }
 
    // Compute results on given data
    result = ComputeFibonacci(steps);
  }
 
  // Set output data
  if (result != null)
  {
    data.SetData(0, result.Value);
  }
}

The full source code for this revision can be seen here.