[luau] A Mission For Luau

[MonMotha]

Depending on you you paralellize it, you may run in to trouble with 
hubbed 10baseT.

Mosix, for example, craves bandwidth by it's very nature (basically 
extending your system to make it act something like a HUGE SMP system). 
  Think of how fast your CPU front side bus is then compare that to 
10mbit ethernet, then factor in the fact that you will be colliding a 
*LOT* since all hosts will be trying to do a bunch of stuff at once. 
Other forms of paralellization are much less bandwidth dependent.  For 
mosix, Switched 100BaseT is considered a bare minimum due to these 
extremely high bandwidth requirements (if there is a more commonly used 
node, it will often have a GigE uplink I'm told).

Render farms, for example, can have the chunk of what they need to 
render handed them, then given time to cruch it before returning the 
final product.  While it's crunching the scene, it needs no network 
connectivity at all except maybe to inform the master as to its 
progress.  The same applies to distributed.net style, the hosts know how 
to crunch, they just need to be told what part to crunch then upload 
their results.

If you do go hubbed 10BaseT, you should probably put a switch at the 
center to keep the collision domains small, then set the "task 
paralellizer" to hand out work with those collision domains in mind.

Don't you just *LOVE* ethernet? :)  There are much better networks for 
making clusters, but ethernet still has the same thing going for it that 
it did when it came out: it's dirt cheap.  You might be able to get a 
networking company to donate some old switches to you for this; they 
need only be 10Mbit since that's what your hubs are.


--MonMotha


R. Scott Belford wrote:
> 
> On Thursday, April 25, 2002, at 05:13 PM, Dustin Cross wrote:
> 
>> Aloha,
>>
>>    I would be willing to help sort through hardware and build some 
>> working
>> systems.  I also have some 16 port 10-base-T hubs (6) and a couple 
>> 10-base-
>> T systems that can support up to 108 ports if we wanted to try and build
>> some massive parallel system.  10-base-T isn't the best, but it is 
>> free.  I
>> also has a room full of monitors (~20).  Sandi and I have an extra 
>> house on
>> our property that we use as storage.  It doesn't have electricity, so 
>> I run
>> extension cords when I do work out there.  We could store stuff there.  I
>> could run an internet connection out there if we needed.
>>
>> I can think of three things we could do with these types of systems:
>>
>> 1. build usable linux desktops and give them away on a first-come-first-
>> serve basis.
>>
>> 2. use systems not suitable for desktops to make firewall/router servers
>> and give them away on a first-come-first-serve basis.
>>
>> 3. set-up a lab for luau members to learn and play or build a beowulf
>> cluster or something like that.  The problem with this is we need a
>> location.
>>
>> I would really like to see something like the Luau lab set up for Luau
>> members to learn and play and anyone else to come by and learn, but we
>> would need a location and I don't think the termite eaten house on my
>> property would be good.
>>
>> Dusty
> 
> 
> Excellent ideas.  The house sounds great.  All the stuff you already 
> have is incredible.  A LUAU lab would be supreme.  My employer has a lot 
> of locations around the island.  I am going to propose to her the 
> dedication of some space to the community.  It may take a while, but it 
> would be good for her, and great for all of us.  I think that it could 
> happen.  It is a splendid idea, Dusty.  The luau lab.  Yes.
> 
> Off to class now.  No more enthusiastic replies to all these good ideas 
> for the next five hours.  Hope they keep coming.  You guys know best.
> 
> scott
> 
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