NCSA Symera Symbiotic Extensible Resource Architecture

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NCSA Symera(Symbiotic Extensible Resource
Architecture)
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Motivations for Symera

• Distributed computing should be as
  straightforward and as reliable as desktop
  computing.
• Handling distributed objects should be as
  transparent as local thread management.
• Reliability is crucial. The only machine that is
  critical to the success of a process is the
  machine that initialized the process.

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Motivations for Symera (2)

• Workstation independence is critical for
  achieving high reliability and scalability in a
  cluster.
• Each machine maintains its own state.
• The designated Resource Manager/Broker mirrors
  these states.
• Object creation is more dynamic (due to resource
  scheduling) and persistent (due to moniker
  insertion)

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Motivations for Symera (3)

• Do not perpetuate the standard paradigm of
  parallel processing on single mainframe systems.
  The network/user-interrupt reliability will
  always be a factor on independent machine cluster
  systems.
• Successful distributed systems should take
  advantage of the distributed environment, not
  just compensate for it.

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Symera Project Layers

• Cluster management system persistence,
  resource scheduling and security
  
  
• User administration system interfaces, object
  monitoring and software installation
• Application development COM/Symera class support
  libraries and application design

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NT Cluster scenarios
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DCOM Architecture
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Symera Viewer
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SYMERA 1.0 Architecture
Service Manager
Component Manager
Resource Manager
Job Manager
Component Library
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SYMERA 1.0 Architecture
User Interfaces SymView.exe
System Objects SymServ.exe
Applications Libraries SymLib.lib/SymUtils.li
b
Service Object
Resource Manager
API Library
Viewer
Node Monitor
Job Controller
Application
Administration
JobEditor
XMLParser
Objects
Figure 1
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NCSA Symera Distributed System ... Job Submission
Intranet
Internet
Start the application
Windows/Java GUI
HTML form/Java applet
XML Job File
Create a Symera Component
Local (Interactive)
Remote (Batch)
Transfer files
Create a Symera Host (Job Controller)
Symera Cluster
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Job/Process Object Configuration
S3Edit
Node Types
Drone Types
Resource Manager
Job Controller
object database
Drone Object
JobFile
The App
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SYMERA Object Relationships
JobController
Object Server
Object Server
CSymObj
CSymObjRef
CSymMoniker
CSymMoniker
CSymObjRef
CSymObj
Figure 3
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Cradle - Traveling Salesman
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DCOMtest
Local COM
Remote DCOM
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DCOMtest Benchmark Graphs
Latency
Bandwidth
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PovRay Scaling Performance
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Figure 4
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Life3D Class Conversion
User Interface
Distributed Object
CMainWindow
CFaceWindow
CCubeFace
CCubeFace (interface)
CFace (implementation)
CSymObj
CSymObjRef
CSymObj
Original classes
New classes
Symera base classes
Figure 5
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Symera Goals

• Become a system whose architecture is flat and
  distributed, thus providing higher reliability
  and scalability by design
• Handle resource management by a roaming
  object-machine broker which is elected upon
  request, maintaining a recoverable distributed
  state.
• Put identical software on each machine, enabling
  easy installation and troubleshooting.

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Symera Goals (2)

• Clusters will be highly dynamic...able to join,
  quit and reconfigure easily much like membership
  within NT workgroups.
• Create and edit object configurations locally
  using an XML format database, making object
  configuration straightforward and more dynamic.
• Eliminate excessive proprietary structure and
  support flexibility and reliability.

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Current state...

• Symera 1.0 developer preview is scheduled for
  release September 1998.
• Symera 1.0 general public release will be out
  early next year.
• We are currently evaluating suitable distributed
  parallel applications which will drive the future
  development of Symera.