TY - JOUR
T1 - Metasystems
T2 - An approach combining parallel processing and heterogeneous distributed computing systems
AU - Grimshaw, Andrew S.
AU - Weissman, Jon B.
AU - West, Emyly A.
AU - Loyot, Ed C.
PY - 1994/6
Y1 - 1994/6
N2 - A metasystem is a single computing resource composed of a heterogeneous group of autonomous computers linked together by a network. The interconnection network needed to construct large metasystems will soon be in place. To fully exploit these new systems, software that is easy to use, supports large degrees of parallelism, and hides the complexity of the underlying physical architecture must be developed. In this paper we describe our metasystem vision, our approach to constructing a metasystem testbed, and early experimental results. Our approach combines features from earlier work on both parallel processing systems and heterogeneous distributed computing systems. Using the testbed, we have found that data coercion costs are not a serious obstacle to high performance, but that load imbalance induced by differing processor capabilities can limit performance. We then present a mechanism to overcome load imbalance that utilizes user-provided callbacks.
AB - A metasystem is a single computing resource composed of a heterogeneous group of autonomous computers linked together by a network. The interconnection network needed to construct large metasystems will soon be in place. To fully exploit these new systems, software that is easy to use, supports large degrees of parallelism, and hides the complexity of the underlying physical architecture must be developed. In this paper we describe our metasystem vision, our approach to constructing a metasystem testbed, and early experimental results. Our approach combines features from earlier work on both parallel processing systems and heterogeneous distributed computing systems. Using the testbed, we have found that data coercion costs are not a serious obstacle to high performance, but that load imbalance induced by differing processor capabilities can limit performance. We then present a mechanism to overcome load imbalance that utilizes user-provided callbacks.
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U2 - 10.1006/jpdc.1994.1058
DO - 10.1006/jpdc.1994.1058
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:12444306827
SN - 0743-7315
VL - 21
SP - 257
EP - 270
JO - Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing
JF - Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing
IS - 3
ER -