Fortran and Intel oneAPI

Some Fortran developers have been apprehensive about moving to Intel oneAPI.

What is oneAPI? 

oneAPI is an open, cross-industry, standards-based, unified, multiarchitecture, multi-vendor programming model that delivers a common developer experience across accelerator architectures – for faster application performance, more productivity, and greater innovation. The oneAPI initiative encourages collaboration on the oneAPI specification and compatible oneAPI implementations across the ecosystem.  

What is Intel oneAPI? 

Intel oneAPI is a product implementation of oneAPI with the Intel oneAPI Toolkits, which help developers efficiently build, analyse, and optimise high-performance, cross-architecture applications for Intel CPUs, GPUs and FPGAs. 

The tools that comprised Intel Parallel Studio XE and Intel System Studio are now integrated into Intel’s next-generation oneAPI products. The Intel oneAPI Toolkits are upward compatible supersets of the features in the previous studio products. 

Fortran programmers question the need for Intel oneAPI 

Existing Fortran users have questioned the need for oneAPI, thinking that oneAPI focuses on GPUs, C++ and SYCL. And so, many have been reluctant to move away from Intel Parallel Studio XE and embrace Intel oneAPI.

However, below we highlight Intel’s Ron Green exploration of these key questions and concerns. 

As Ron notes in his article, oneAPI includes compilers, performance libraries, tools for profiling and analysis of user programs, an MPI library, frameworks and libraries for machine learning, artificial intelligence, computer vision, and oneAPI includes a distribution for Python*. 

You might not hear about the Intel Fortran Compiler in Intel marketing as it is a well-known, proven leader in the Fortran compiler space, used by many in the community. Its reputation doesn’t require additional marketing.  Whereas, In their defense, the Intel oneAPI DPC++/C++ Compiler and SYCL are making inroads in the software development community and need more exposure and press than the already well-established Fortran Compiler.

Why Fortran programmers should move from PSXE to oneAPI 

Some Fortran programmers wonder if Intel oneAPI is just about GPUs. Heterogeneous computing, including accelerators like GPUs, is a significant part of the Intel oneAPI strategy. However, the Intel Fortran Compiler supports offloading to Intel GPUs, and a recent new feature allows you to automatically offload DO CONCURRENT blocks to GPU. The compilers always provide performance for Intel Architecture CPUs. 

Moving from Intel Parallel Studio XE (PSXE) to oneAPI offers superior Fortran Standards support, bug fixes, and compatibility with the latest Intel processors. The Fortran compiler in oneAPI keeps up with the latest Fortran Standards and maintains support for OpenMP features. You can see a detailed table of both Fortran Standard features and OpenMP features on Intel’s Fortran Language and OpenMP* Features page.

The latest version of Intel Fortran in oneAPI should perform all the functions of older PSXE Fortran compilers. 

PSXE is no longer supported, so bug fixes and security updates are not provided for older versions. Security fixes are important, and unsupported PSXE versions lack the latest functional and security updates. Without security updates, your software becomes vulnerable to cyberattacks. You can head to one of our other blogs to learn more about the importance of updating your software and patch management. 

Technology is constantly evolving, and newer software and hardware require updated compilers. Older versions of Intel Fortran may not be compatible with the latest operating systems and IDEs, creating compatibility and security issues. 

It is recommended to move away from PSXE due to compatibility, support, security, and performance reasons. 

Want to move to Intel oneAPI? 

Grey Matter is here to help. As an Intel Software Reseller, we’re on hand to provide licensing advice, exclusive pricing, and information about Intel Priority Support. 

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