Grid Computing

Mansoor Ahmed
Aziz 7865
Warda Aqil
BSE/BCE – 5

Abstract as an efficient and cost-effective way of getting the most

There is no consensus among scholars and technology of what was then very expensive hardware.
writers about the origins of grid computing. Perhaps the Its 1970: Computers are big mainframes that cost
different opinions are due to terminology and that some hundreds of thousands of dollars, every second has to be
authors use utility computing while others prefer grid accounted for, and those otherwise "wasted" cycles can be
computing. used to get the most out of the cost.
The term Grid computing originated in the early 1990s
as a metaphor for making computer power as easy to
Key Words- Grid, Discipline, Field, Subject, Subtopic access as an electric power grid in Ian Foster and Carl
and. Kesselmans seminal work, "The Grid: Blueprint for a
new computing infrastructure".
1. Introduction CPU scavenging and volunteer computing were
popularized beginning in 1997 by distributed.net and
Grid computing (or the use of a computational grid) is
later in 1999 by SETI@home to harness the power of
applying the resources of many computers in a network
networked PCs worldwide, in order to solve CPU-
to a single problem at the same time - usually to a
intensive research problems.
scientific or technical problem that requires a great
number of computer processing cycles or access to large
amounts of data. It is a form of distributed computing 3. The Grid Problem
based on the dynamic sharing of resources between
participants, organizations and companies with the aim Grid computing has evolved into an important
of combining these resources and carrying out intensive discipline within the computer industry by differentiating
computing applications or the processing of vast amounts itself from distributed computing through an increased
of data. The creation of a "virtual supercomputer" by focus on resource sharing, co-ordination, manageability,
using a network of geographically dispersed computers. and high performance. The focus on resource sharing is
It also refers to the automated sharing and coordination called the grid problem, which can be defined as the set
of the collective processing power of many widely of problems associated with resource sharing among a set
scattered, robust computers that are not normally of individuals or groups. This sharing of resources,
centrally controlled, and that are subject to open ranging from simple file transfers to complex and
standards. Other terms employed in this context include: collaborative problem solving, is accomplished under
Autonomic computing, Data-centre virtualization, On- controlled and well-defined conditions and policies. In
demand computing, Public resource computing, and this context, the critical problems are resource discovery,
utility computing. It also can be used for load balancing authentication, authorization, and access mechanisms.
as well as high availability by employing multiple Resource sharing is further complicated when a grid is
computers. introduced as a solution for utility computing, where
commercial applications and resources become available
as shareable and on-demand resources. This concept of
2. History commercial on-demand utility grid services adds new,
more difficult challenges to the already complicated grid
There is no consensus among scholars and technology problem list, including service level features, accounting,
writers about the origins of grid computing. Perhaps the usage metering, flexible pricing, federated security,
different opinions are due to terminology and that some scalability, and open-ended integration.
authors use utility computing while others prefer grid
computing. It's probably fair to say that the origins of 4. Evolution of Grid Computing
grid computing came out of the early days of computer
networks where using the "spare" CPU cycles was seen During recent years, we have witnessed a major
paradigm shift in distributed computing principles, with
a focus towards service orientation, open standards interoperability among resource providers and users in
integration, collaboration, and virtualization. One order to establish the sharing relationships. This
particular area of interest centers on the evolution of grid interoperability, in turn, necessitates common protocols
computing principles into the mainstream of distributed at each layer of the architectural model, which leads to
computing and Web services. In this paper, we focus our the definition of a grid protocol architecture.
analysis on this evolution and the significance of
achieving some form of standardization of grid-
computing architecture principles. This paper presents 8. High Level Overview of Grid Computing
the technology standards that are driving major grid
initiatives and explains in simple terms how these The most common description of grid computing
standards and technologies are aligned with the IBM on includes an analogy to a power grid. When you plug an
demand business concepts. In addition, we discuss the appliance or other object requiring electrical power into a
recent Web services specifications related to state full receptacle, you expect that there is power of the correct
resources (i.e., resources whose behavior is defined with voltage available, but the actual source of that power is
respect to their underlying state) and how these standards not known. Your local utility company provides the
relate to grid computing. We conclude with discussions interface into a complex network of generators and power
exploring major aspects of grid-computing adoption sources and provides you with (in most cases) an
models and some significant attributes that influence the acceptable quality of service for your energy demands.
transformation, collaboration, and virtualization features Rather than each house or neighborhood having to obtain
of these models. and maintain its own generator of electricity, the power
grid infrastructure provides a virtual generator. The
5. Grid as a Virtual Organization generator is highly reliable and adapts to the power needs
of the consumers based on their demand.
A virtual organization (VO) is a dynamic group of The vision of grid computing is similar. Once the proper
individuals, groups, or organizations who define the kind of infrastructure is in place, a user will have access
conditions and rules for sharing resources. The concept to a virtual computer that is reliable and adaptable to the
of the VO is the key to grid computing. All VOs share user’s needs. This virtual computer will consist of many
some characteristics and issues, including common diverse computing resources. But these individual
concerns and requirements that may vary in size, scope, resources will not be visible to the user, just as the
duration, sociology, and structure. The members of any consumer of electric power is unaware of how their
VO negotiate the sharing of resources based upon the electricity is being generated. To reach this vision, there
rules and conditions defined by the VO, and the members must be standards for grid computing that will allow a
then share the resources in the VO's constructed resource secure and robust infrastructure to be built. Standards
pool. such as the Open Grid Services Architecture (OGSA) and
tools such as those provided by the Globus Toolkit
6. Grid Computing Different from provide the necessary framework. Initially, businesses
Distributed Computing will build their own infrastructures (what we might call
intra-grids), but over time, these grids will become
Grid computing can be differentiated from almost all interconnected. This interconnection will be made
distributed computing paradigms by this defining possible by standards such as OGSA and the analogy of
characteristic: The essence of grid computing lies in the grid computing to the power grid will become real.
efficient and optimal utilization of a wide range of
heterogeneous, loosely coupled resources in an 9. Types of Grids
organization tied to sophisticated workload management
capabilities or information virtualization. (An Grid computing can be used in a variety of ways to
organization can span multiple departments, physical address various kinds of application requirements. Often,
locations, and so on.) grids are categorized by the type of solutions that they
7. Grid Architecture best address. The three primary types of grids are
summarized below. Of course, there are no hard
A new architecture model and technology has been boundaries between these grid types and often grids may
developed for the establishment and management of be a combination of two or more of these. However, as
cross-organizational resource sharing. This new you consider developing applications that may run in a
architecture, called grid architecture, identifies the basic grid environment, remember that the type of grid
components of a grid system. The grid architecture environment that you will be using will affect many of
defines the purpose and functions of its components, your decisions.
while indicating how these components interact with one
another. The main focus of the architecture is on 9.1. Computational Grid
 A computational grid is focused on setting aside busy and are working at appropriate times and
resources specifically for computing power. In this type periods. A standardized method of describing
of grid, most of the machines are high-performance the grid service will help give structure to this
servers. area, as it will enable grid implementations to
specify how work needs to be scheduled.
9.2. Scavenging Grid
• Work unit management -- Effective grid
A scavenging grid is most commonly used with large services require management of the distribution
numbers of desktop machines. Machines are scavenged of work units to ensure that the work is evenly
for available CPU cycles and other resources. Owners of spread over the service providers. Without a
the desktop machines are usually given control over standard way of advertising and managing this
when their resources are available to participate in the process, it's possible for some service providers
grid. to sit idle while others have massive work
queues that take them inordinate amounts of
9.3. Data Grid time to process.

A data grid is responsible for housing and providing • Dispatch management -- The role of brokering
access to data across multiple organizations. Users are work units and dispatching them to clients can
not concerned with where this data is located as long as be handled in myriad ways. Not having a
they have access to the data. For example, you may have standard method of doing so, however, restricts
two universities doing life science research, each with the service providers that can connect to and
unique data. A data grid would allow them to share their accept units of work and also restricts the ability
data, manage the data, and manage security issues such of grid services users -- the requesters -- to
as who has access to what data. submit the work.
The advantages of the standardized approach
10. Grid Infrastructure Components are many, but they all boil down to the same
basic advantage: the extension and expansion of
These are the main components of a grid the resources available for grid computing. More
infrastructure: specifically, following the OGSI standard should
• Security. Security is an important consideration provide the following benefits:
in Grid computing. Each grid resource may • Interoperability -- It should be possible to mix
have different security policies that need to be and match service provider components, and
complied with. A single sign-on authentication dispatch tracking systems and systems
method is a necessity. A commonly agreed-upon management. Most important, though, is that
method of negotiating authorization is also grid systems can be developed and designed in a
needed. variety of languages and within a variety of
different platforms easily and efficiently. All of
• Resource management. When a job is these factors should make it easier to dispatch
submitted, the grid resource manager is work to service providers and for service
concerned with assigning a resource to the job, providers to find grid services and systems that
monitoring its status, and returning its results. they can attach to.

• Information services. For the grid resource • Increased capacity -- With more platforms and
manager to make informed decisions on environments supported and the ability to more
resource assignments, the grid resource manager easily publish the services available, it should
needs to know what grid resources are available, lead to an increase in the available capacity.
as well as their capacities and current
utilization. This knowledge about the grid • Flexibility -- With a wider range of clients and
resources is maintained and provided by Grid for the clients a wider range of grids, this
Information Service (GIS), also known as the increased flexibility means that grid users can
Monitoring and Discovery Service (MDS). increase their computing capacity. With the
• Data management. Data management is components talking the same language, we can
switch between grid systems and jobs from the
concerned with how jobs transfer data or access
client and server perspective. This will allow
shared storage.
grid users to reserve more capacity and allow
• Scheduling -- Work must be scheduled across clients a wider choice of projects to support.
the service providers to ensure that they are kept
 • Speed of development -- Using a standard tool
kit will make the development of grid systems [1] A.B. Smith, C.D. Jones, and E.F. Roberts, “Article
much faster. Rather than spending time Title”, Journal, Publisher, Location, Date, pp. 1-10.
developing communication and management
systems to help support your grid system, you [2] Jones, C.D., A.B. Smith, and E.F. Roberts, Book Title,
can instead spend time optimizing the routines Publisher, Location, Date.
that process the data.
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