data flow analysis


data flow analysis

[′dad·ə ¦flō ə‚nal·ə·səs] (computer science) The development of models for the movement of information within an organization, indicating the sources and destinations of information and where and how information is transmitted, processed, and stored.

data flow analysis

(programming)A process to discover the dependencies betweendifferent data items manipulated by a program. The order ofexecution in a data driven language is determined solely bythe data dependencies. For example, given the equations

1. X = A + B2. B = 2 + 23. A = 3 + 4

a data-flow analysis would find that 2 and 3 must be evaluatedbefore 1. Since there are no data dependencies between 2 and3, they may be evaluated in any order, including in parallel.

This technique is implemented in hardware in somepipelined processors with multiple functional units. Itallows instructions to be executed as soon as their inputs areavailable, independent of the original program order.