Problems with Asymmetric Multi-Processing: Not all cores are made equal

Jumping from single core to multiple cores was a quantum leap in the understanding of computation. This brought with it the whole science of SMP (Symmetric Multi-Processing). SMP systems provided the required formalisms for multiple ‘identical processors’ and multiple ‘identical cores’. Operating systems quickly adapted to this newer reality and researchers quickly developed newer formalisms to provide abstractions to correctly model them.
But things change quickly and we saw a sudden change from SMPs to AMPs (Asymmetric multi-processors). Latest processors now have multiple cores on the same processor all having different functions. A typical example from NVidia Tegra processor has the following cores on it:

1. CPU cores
2. Video Encode core
3. Video Decode core
4. Audio processing core
5. Graphics Processor core
6. Floating point processor core
7. Image Processor core
8. Display core
9. Memory processing cores

Software designers need to upgrade their skills and tools to match this new reality. Such processors present newer challenges to programming and styles. Such disruptive changes vouch even more strongly of the separation of runtime concerns from coding time concerns.