4. Introduction To Clusters
o Parallel processing, the method of having many small tasks solve
one large problem, has emerged as a key enabling technology in
modern computing .
o In past several years Parallel Processing is increasing for :
High performance scientific computing
General purpose applications
o It results in :
High performance
Low cost
Sustain productivity
5. What is Clustering ?
Meaning :
o Clustering is a parallel or distributed system consisting of
independent computers that corporate as a single system.
o Cluster offers a way to use a computer more productively in
comparison to when number of machines working standalone.
8. Introduction to Parallelism
o Parallel Processing refers to the concept of speeding-up the
execution of the program by dividing the program into multiple
fragments.
o Parallel Processing operates on two levels :
a. Hardware Parallelism
b. Software Parallelism
9.
10. Parallel Processing Schemes
o There are different approaches to creating effective parallel
computers , and all of them have different levels of effectiveness
for different kind of problems.
o Some of the methods are :
Symmetric Multiprocessing (SMP)
Non-Uniform Memory Access (NUMA)
Uniform Memory Access (UMA)
Single Instruction Multiple Data (SIMD)
Multiple Instruction Multiple Data (MIMD)
16. Brief History Of Clusters
o In the summer of 1994 Thomas Sterling and Don Becker working
at CESDIS under sponsorship of the EES project, built a cluster of
16 DX4 processors connected by channel bonded Ethernet .
o They called their machines Beowulf .
22. Design Issues
o Design Issues considers :
1. Size Scalability (physical & application)
2. Enhanced Availability (failure management)
3. Single System Image (SSI look-and-feel of same system)
4. Fast Communication (network & protocols)
5. Programmability (simple API if required)
24. Topology
o Currently used topologies in networking are :
Ring
Bus
Star
Line
Mesh
Tree etc.
o We are using star topology due to following reason :
Failure of one node does not effect entire network
Range provided by star topology is greater than that of bus topology
Range can be extended by using routers
28. o They submit their job processed by system and look at the result
of their work.
o It requires :
CPU capable system as master node with fast CPU
Greater than 128 MB RAM
8 GB HDD or more
10 Mbps/ 100 Mbps Ethernet adapter.
29. Hardware Requirement for SLAVE NODE:
o Slave nodes are useful for computation only.
o For Slave node hard disk capacity need to be very large for
better storage capacity.
o It requires,
CPU based system with fast CPU
32 MB or more memory modules
4 GB HDD or more
10 Mbps/ 100 Mbps Ethernet adapter.
30. Software Requirement
o The platform (O.S.) for developing cluster is very important
because the throughput and performance of machine is totally
depends upon how the platform manages the whole cluster.
o Some of the O.S that supports Clustering are,
Linux
Unix
Windows 2000
Windows NT
31. Why Linux ?
o Linux is generally cheaper than other O.S and is frequently less
problematic than many commercial systems.
o Linux is chosen because :
1. It is a 32-bit multitasking Operating System.
2. It runs on hardware ranging from low-end 386 boxes to massive ultra-
parallel machines.
3. Linux has a very strong networking support & also its efficient processing
support.
4. The programming environments & development tools for parallel
programming are more mature in Linux.
32. Cluster Architecture
o It covers :
Network Interface Hardware
Communication Software
Cluster Middleware
37. Applications
o General high performance computing
o Bulk disk servers
o High performance web servers
o Flight simulators
o Alife
38. Clustering Examples
o It is used in :
NASA uses Beowulf which was started in a project headed up by CESDIS
NOAA uses several Clustering technologies in their project
Google.com introduced largest ever LINUX cluster which powers their popular
web search engine
40. Book References :
o Red Hat Linux System & Network Administration
o Building Linux Clusters -David HM Spector (Oreilley Publications)
o Beginning Linux Programming - Wrox Publications
41. Web Reference :
www.beowlf.org
www.redhat.com/mirrors/LDP
www.jics.utk.edu Parallel Computing Resources
www.linux-mag.com/gallery.html Linux Magazine Open Source