[ale] beowulf clustering

[James P. Kinney III]

PVM and MPI are used to split up parallel processing tasks to multiple
machines. Mosix makes a "cluster" look like a big box. It just farms out
tasks to whatever cpu is snoozing. It really doesn't do parallel
processing. So offloading some number crunching from a busy box to a not
busy box sounds like a good use for Mosix.

If the Mosix process is reniced to a higher number than most user space
processes (0), then the shared process will take a backseat to the
keyboard pounder. By setting it to a nice of around 10, it will only
wake up and get cpu time in a manner similar to seti-at-home.

On Thu, 2003-03-20 at 21:18, Chris Fowler wrote:
> MPI and PVM make a cluster.  I was reading an old version of OSDJ that I
> picked up at ALS 2000.  It had an article about MPI.  What makes a
> Beowulf cluster work is the MPI and/or PVM libraries.  Basically the
> only programs that would even use the cluster would be those programed
> for the cluster.
> 
> I wish we could have clusters that software did not have to be made
> aware of.  We're just not there yet.
> 
> If you are going to write software that uses either of the above
> libraries then you'll need something like Beowulf. I'm not sure about
> Mosix.  
> 
> On Thu, 2003-03-20 at 21:04, Christopher Bergeron wrote:
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> >  
> > Have any of you guys set up a Beowulf cluster?  Is it difficult?  Can it 
> > be done with off-the-shelf components?
> > 
> > I'm asking because I think my office is a perfect environment for it.  
> > We have a "call-center" style setup, and depending on conditions, an 
> > empty seat _could_ [I'm assuming; based on my current Beowulf knowledge} 
> > be turned into an extra processor; thereby, adding a little horsepower 
> > of the unseated machine to our intranet / network subsystem.
> > 
> > Keith's previous post (with the SystemImager link) planted the seed for 
> > this idea, so thanks Keith!  (also - Keith: I would think you'd have 
> > learned your way around Tokyo by now.  Maybe you should get out a little 
> > bit and learn the layout of the town so you're not still Lost  :)
> > 
> > As always, much thanks guys,
> > CB
> > 
> > 
> > 
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> > 
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-- 
James P. Kinney III          \Changing the mobile computing world/
CEO & Director of Engineering \          one Linux user         /
Local Net Solutions,LLC        \           at a time.          /
770-493-8244                    \.___________________________./
http://www.localnetsolutions.com

GPG ID: 829C6CA7 James P. Kinney III (M.S. Physics) <jkinney at localnetsolutions.com>
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