The simulation is useful to support the design and performance evaluation of complex systems, possibly composed by a massive number of interacting entities. For this reason, the simulation of such systems may need aggregate computation and memory resources obtained by clusters of parallel and distributed execution units. Shared computer clusters composed of available Commercial-Off-the-Shelf hardware are preferable to dedicated systems, mainly for cost reasons. The performance of distributed simulations is influenced by the heterogeneity of execution units and by their respective CPU load in background. Adaptive load balancing mechanisms could improve the resources utilization and the simulation process execution, by dynamically tuning the simulation load with an eye to the synchronization and communication overheads reduction. In this work it will be presented the GAIA+ framework: a new load balancing mechanism for distributed simulation. The framework has been evaluated by performing testbed simulations of a wireless ad hoc network model. Results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed solutions.

1. Gabriele D’Angelo joint work with Luciano Bononi Michele Bracuto Lorenzo Donatiello University of Bologna Department of Computer Science WOMP 2006 – Sorrento (NA) An Adaptive Load Balancing Middleware for Distributed Simulation

12. Performance evaluation: Equal Distribution (scenario a)

13. Performance evaluation: MHz-based Distribution (scenario b)

14. Performance evaluation: Variable Background Load (scenario c)

15. Performance evaluation: Wall-Clock-Time (WCT) WCT (seconds) to complete a simulation run of 1000 timesteps -21.10 % 4128 5232 c -10.41 % 3568 3989 b -4.38 % 3442 3600 a diff (%) GAIA+ GAIA scenario

17. Gabriele D’Angelo [email_address] http://www.cs.unibo.it/~gdangelo University of Bologna Department of Computer Science WOMP 2006, Sorrento (NA) An Adaptive Load Balancing Middleware for Distributed Simulation