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Beowulf Cluster

A cluster consists of interconnected standalone computers that work together as a single computing resource over a network. A Beowulf cluster is a type of cluster made up of commodity computers running open-source operating systems like Linux, connected via TCP/IP. They began in the 1990s and are now used widely in research for computationally intensive tasks like fluid dynamics, genetics, and media rendering by sharing processing via message passing interfaces. Factors enabling their growth include cheaper commodity hardware and open-source software.

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263 views13 pages

Beowulf Cluster

A cluster consists of interconnected standalone computers that work together as a single computing resource over a network. A Beowulf cluster is a type of cluster made up of commodity computers running open-source operating systems like Linux, connected via TCP/IP. They began in the 1990s and are now used widely in research for computationally intensive tasks like fluid dynamics, genetics, and media rendering by sharing processing via message passing interfaces. Factors enabling their growth include cheaper commodity hardware and open-source software.

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surya_jus4u
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© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
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P.S.

CHANDRA KANTH
06951A0570
Btech CSE IV year
What are clusters?
A cluster is a type of parallel or distributed
processing system, which consists of a
collection of interconnected standalon
computers co - operatively working together
as a single, integrated computing resource.
This cluster of computers shares common
networkcharacteristics like the same
namespace and it is available toother
computers on the network as a single
resource.
What is beowulf?
Mythical Old-English hero who defeats
Grendel, the green dragon
Movie starring a CG-animated Angelina Jolie
Cluster architecture
Beowulf cluster history
1993 - Becker & Sterling started Beowulf project
1994 – Becker & Sterling constructed a 16 node
cluster
1996 – DOE and NASA demonstrate beowulf cluster
that surpasses 1GFlop/s
1997 – Caltech demonstrates beowulf cluster that
surpasses 10GFlop/s
Present – beowulf clusters are used at many
universities, industries, and government sites
What is a beowulf
cluster?
Collection of stand-alone computer networked
together
Network equipment to connect computers
Software
Operating system software
Application software
Communication software (MPI, OpenMP)
A Beowulf cluster is a group of usually identical PC
computers running a  Free and Open Source
Software (FOSS)  Unix-like operating system, such
as BSD, Linux or Solaris.
They are networked into a small  TCP/IP LAN, and
have libraries and programs installed which allow
processing to be shared among them.
There is no particular piece of software that defines
a cluster as a Beowulf.
Commonly used parallel processing libraries include
MPI (Message Passing Interface) and PVM (Parallel
Virtual Machine).
The Borg, a 52-node Beowulf cluster used by the 
McGill University pulsargroup to search for pulsations
from binary pulsars
Contributing Factors
 A number of factors have contributed to the growth of Beowulf
class computers.

 The prevalence of computers for office automation, home


computing, games and entertainment now provide system
designers with new types of cost-effective components.
 The COTS industry now provides fully assembled subsystems
(microprocessors, motherboards, disks and network interface
cards).
 Mass market competition has driven the prices down and
reliability up for these subsystems.
 The availability of open source software, particularly the Linux
operating system, GNU compilers and programming tools and
MPI and PVM message passing libraries.
Programs like the HPCC program have produced
many years of experience working with parallel
algorithms.

The recognition that obtaining high performance,


even from vendor provided, parallel platforms is hard
work and requires researchers to adopt a do-it-
yourself attitude.

An increased reliance on computational science


which demands high performance computing.
Uses of Beowulf Cluster
People use Beowulf Clusters to solve computational
intensive tasks
Beowulf Clusters are used typically used to solve tasks
that take several hours to days and even weeks to
complete. These include :
*Computational fluid dynamics for aerospace
*Financial market modeling (eg. with Monte Carlo
simulations)
*Genomics Sequencing
*Computational Chemistry
*Seismic Analysis
*Digital Media Rendering
*Electronic & Design Applications
Conclusion
Clusters are promising
Solve parallel processing paradox
Offer incremental growth and matches with
funding pattern
New trends in hardware and software
technologies are likely to make clusters more
promosing and fill SSI gap.
Clusters based super computers (Linux based
clusters) can be seen every where!
REFERENCE
www.buyya.com
www.beowulf.org
www.clustercomp.org

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