Parallel programming truly redefines the programming model for multicore architecture,
which has become commonplace. For this reason, parallel programming has been elevated to
a core technology in the Microsoft .NET Framework 4. In this version of the .NET Framework,
the Task Parallel Library (TPL) and the System.Threading.Tasks namespace contain the parallel
programming implementation. Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 has also been enhanced and now
includes several features to aid in creating and maintaining parallel applications. If you are a
Microsoft developer looking to decompose your application into parallel tasks that execute
over separate processor cores, then Visual Studio 2010 and the TPL are the tools you need.
Parallel Programming with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Step by Step provides an organized
walkthrough of using Visual Studio 2010 to create parallel applications. It discusses
the TPL and parallel programming concepts in considerable detail; however, this book is still
introductory—it covers the basics of each realm of parallel programming, such as task and
data parallelism. Although the book does not provide exhaustive coverage of every parallel
programming topic, it does offer essential guidance in using the concepts of parallel
programming.
In addition to its coverage of core parallel programming concepts, the book discusses concurrent
collections and thread synchronization, and it guides you in maintaining and debugging
parallel applications by using Visual Studio. Beyond the explanatory content, most
chapters include step-by-step examples and downloadable sample projects that you can
explore for yourself.