Re: what's the aim?

On Tue, 2 Sep 2003, andrey mirtchovski wrote:

> i have read that very same book (or at least large parts of it) and it left
> me puzzled too. i was only partly joking when i said 'nobody can be told
> what the grid is'.

well, unlike most of the guys I know doing grid stuff, I've actually done 
applications which used hundreds of nodes and got real work done. It can 
work. It's useful. 

I used condor and Suns and at one point had two 200-node flocks and one 
100-node flock. Therein lies a tale. The limit on creating one 500-node 
flock was the issue of providing services across administrative 
boundaries. It was really a nightmare for us. Plan 9 solves that nightmare 
very nicely. 


> this is genuine 'resource sharing' but it isn't a grid, because it requires
> me to create an account for Dan on my auth server. conversely if anyone
> else wants to share resources with me (Bell Labs' sources for example) they
> need to create an account for me on their auth server.

This is the problem we ought to try to fix.

If you look at all the grid systems extant, however, they require 
programmers to get involved in fixing the program for the grid system. 

Plan 9 is unique in that it has a secure way to provide what these systems 
provide, and on top of all that, you need make no changes to your program 
at all. Plan 9 is the system that all the grid wannabes wannabe. Hence our 
interest.

thanks

ron