Tim Harris - Architect

I am at Oracle Labs in Cambridge, UK. My research interests span multiple layers of the stack. I am particularly interested in parallel programming, OS / runtime-system interaction, and opportunities for specialized architecture support for particular workloads.

Right now I am looking at OS and VM support for distributed runtime systems—particularly in the setting of distributed graph algorithms running on clusters. I collaborate with the Scalable Synchronization group in Burlington, MA, USA, and with the Green-Marl project in CA, USA.

Prior to Oracle, my recent projects have included language support for asynchronous message passing in the Barrelfish research OS, and ideas for architecture support for parts of language runtime systems (e.g., synchronization and GC). I have also worked extensively on transactional memory (TM), most recently on applying ideas learnt from STM systems to designing an abstraction for low-cost multi-word atomic updates for use in building shared-memory data structures. I was on the faculty of the University of Cambridge, and completed a PhD on providing application programmers with safe control over low-level features of the JVM (dynamic complication, object placement, thread scheduling).