Qimage setPixel with openmp parallel for doesn't work - c++

Question

The code works without parallelism, but when I add pragma omp parallel, it doesn't work. Furthermore, the code works perfectly with pragma omp parallel if I don't add setPixel. So, I would like to know why the parallelism doesn't work properly and exits the program with code 255 when I try to set pixel in the new image. This code wants to change an image doing two loops to change every pixel using a Gauss vector. If something can't be understood I'll solve it inmediately.
for (h = 0; h < height; h++){
QRgb* row = (QRgb*) result->scanLine(h);
//#pragma omp parallel for schedule(dynamic) num_threads(cores) private (j, auxazul, auxrojo, auxverde) reduction(+:red,green,blue)
for (w = 0; w < width; w++) {
red=green=blue=0;
minj = max((M-w),0);
supj = min((width+M-w),N);
for (j=minj; j<supj; j++){
auxazul = azul [w-M+j][h];
auxrojo = rojo [w-M+j][h];
auxverde = verde [w-M+j][h];
red += vectorGauss[j]*auxrojo;
green += vectorGauss[j]*auxverde;
blue += vectorGauss[j]*auxazul;
}
red /= 256; green /= 256; blue /= 256;
//result->setPixel(w,h,QColor(red,green,blue).rgba());
row[w] = QColor(red,green,blue).rgba();
}

Answer 1

QImage::setPixel is not thread safe, since it calls the detach() method (have a look at the official documentation here). Remember QImage uses implicit sharing.
Besides, setPixel() is extremely slow. If you are seeking performance (as someone usually do when dealing with parallel implementations), that's not the best way to go.
Using scanLine() as you already do in the example provided is the correct way of doing it.

Answer 2

Beside the comment that setPixel is slow and not thread safe, you currently have a race condition when writing the result
row[w] = QColor(red,green,blue).rgba();
Your code is slow in the first place because you are accessing your color matrices in a memory inefficient way. Pumping threads will make this part worse. Given that you loop on each scanline, you would like to have the transposee of your color matrices. Which allow you to do :
for (h = 0; h < height; h++){
QRgb* row = (QRgb*) result->scanLine(h);
auto azulscan = azul [h];
auto rojoscan = rojo [h];
auto verdescan = verde [h];
for (w = 0; w < width; w++) {
red=green=blue=0;
minj = max((M-w),0);
supj = min((width+M-w),N);
for (j=minj; j<supj; j++){
auto auxazul = azulscan [w-M+j];
auto auxrojo = rojoscan [w-M+j];
auto auxverde = verdescan [w-M+j];
red += vectorGauss[j]*auxrojo;
green += vectorGauss[j]*auxverde;
blue += vectorGauss[j]*auxazul;
}
row[w] = QColor(red,green,blue).rgba();
}
}
I dont know openmp well but you want to have a single thread per scanline, so your parallel loop need to be above the first loop. Something like
#pragma omp parallel for whatever
for (h = 0; h < height; h++){
QRgb* row;
#pragma omp critical
{
row = = (QRgb*) result->scanLine(h);
}
....
}
Another point. You can use std::inner_product to compute the color value in a single line once you have the transpose of the color inputs.
green = std::inner_product(&vectorGauss[minj], &vectorGauss[supj-1]+1, &verdescan[w-M+jmin], &verdescan[w-M+supj]+1)