statement from the opening page

from Andrey, mods from me, comments?

9grid is a collaboration between a geographically diverse group of Plan 9
enthusiasts. The goal of 9grid is to utilize the distributed features of
the "Plan 9 from Bell-Labs" operating system to create a tightly-coupled
grid-like environment in which running application can cross the
boundaries of the local cluster or institution and utilize resources
potentially available at locations far away.


A distinguishing feature of 9grid is its security model. Plan 9 is a far 
more secure system, from the ground up, than any Unix system extant. We 
have no need of add-ons to Plan 9 to make it grid-capable. We have no need 
of firewalls -- 9grid nodes are connected to the network outside the 
firewall. As users attach to nodes on the 9grid, their entire file system 
name space is visible from all the nodes which they are using -- and 
invisible to anyone else. 


9grid has no need of the Globus toolkit; we can make the case that
Plan 9 is a grid
operating system <i>sui generis</i>. Were one to attempt to design
a Grid operating system, it would probably end up looking like Plan 9.

Adding Plan 9 capabilities to Linux is possible (as in v9fs) but it is not 
possible to make the full capabilities of Plan 9 available on Linux or 
other Unix-derived operating systems. Since Plan 9 is now open source, we 
decided to use Plan 9 directly. 


Hence, what separates us from other Grid projects (such as Globus) is the 
novel approach we're taking to grid and distributed computing -- we tear 
away the 30-year old heritage of the UNIX environment, and instead of 
attempting to fit that into our new computing model, we start off with a 
brand new paradigm which enables communication between remote sites to be 
performed cheaply, and more importantly in a way consistent across the 
entire grid. Instead of setting out to design sets of protocols to handle 
various aspects of communication between sites we take the 9P protocol, 
already finely suited for the job, and modify our applications to use it 
to its full potential. 


Our hope is that by showing that grids can be built (and maintained!) with 
minimum effort we will open a new page in distributed computing, one where 
time can be spent solving computational problems using Grids, instead of 
spending it trying to get layers upon layers of software on an outdated 
operating system (i.e. Unix and its clones) to work together.