Grid Computing

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Grid Computing
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What is Grid Computing?

• Grid Computing is applying the resources of many
  computers in a network to a single entity at the
  same time
• Usually to a scientific or technical entity that
  requires a great number of computer processing
  cycles or access to large amounts of data.

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Mastermind behind the Grid

• Originated in the early 1990's
• Ian Foster, Carl Kesselman, and Steve Tuecke
• Fathers of the grid
• Their focus was to create a supercomputer that
  would be easy to access as an electric power
  grid.
• Resulted in a blueprint for a new computing
  infrastructure.

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Moores Law

• In 1965 one of the founders of Intel, George
  Moore came up with a law called Moore's Law. In
  this law he believed that the number of
  transistors that could be squeezed on to a
  silicon chip was doubling every year, and
  overtime this has been revised to doubling every
  18 months. It is said that Moore's law is a
  misused concept in computing.

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Before the Grid

• FAFNER
• 'Factoring Via Network Enabled Recursion
• (this was aimed to factorize very large numbers a
  challenge very relevant to digital security)
• I-WAY
• 'Information Wide Area Year
• (aimed to link supercomputers using existing
  networks)

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Grid in Action

• SETI _at_home
• 'Search for the Extraterrestrial Intelligence'
• Many users share the unused processor cycles of
  their PC's in a vast search for signs of rational
  signals from outer space.

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5 Components of Grid Computing
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Contd... 5 Components of Grid Computing

• Resource Use
• resources of computers should be efficient and
  balanced
• Death of distance
• distance should make no difference, you should be
  able to access to computer resources wherever you
  are

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Contd... 5 Components of Grid Computing

• Open Standard everyone can contribute
  constructively to grid development

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Controlling Grid Data

• Managing data is huge and complex
• The data is either too large or too small to fit
  memory space

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Building your own Grid

• Architecture is the overall design of the
  project, it holds the fundamental components of a
  grid's purpose and function
• Hardware is the central key component that the
  grid depends on, without computers and networks
  you can't have a grid
• Middleware is what makes a grid possible, it is
  the middleman that holds, keeps or puts
  everything together

• They are many approaches to building a grid,
  however one must first develop it's architecture,
  then the hardware and finally the middleware

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Grid Today

• Today the grid is used to collect resources of
  many computers to perform large scales of
  operation. It has derived from a tool used only
  for scientific research and educational purposes
  into a powerful way to deliver business to
  commercial and government organizations.

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Future of the Grid

• The future of the grid seems to be a promising
  trend for three reasons.
• The first reason is it's ability to make more
  cost-effective use of a given amount of computer
  resources.
• The second is a way to solve problems that can't
  be approached without an enormous amount of
  computing power.
• The third is that the resources of many computers
  can be collaborated toward a common objectives.