via cloudtechsite.com

via cloudtechsite.com

The main features of high performance computing include direct control of complex systems connected in parallel manner. This control allows fine tuning of application software to an ultimate extent in order to achieve optimal results with the target hardware. Acquiring the cloud computing environment for HPC (High Performance Computing) is debatable. The main issue that is to be pondered upon is that whether it would be suitable to surrender almost full control of applications voluntarily before automated software managers and cloud owners (as it goes with the cloud computing environment)?

The issue is really complex and sensitive but solvable. In order to get the correct understanding of the solution, the implications, repercussions and working requirements of HPC must be evaluated in the scenario of cloud computing. As it is known that the cloud computing may be used at three significant levels. The levels are,

i.            Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS):

ii.            Platform as a Service (PaaS).

iii.            Application as a Service (AaaS).

All of these ways of exploiting cloud computing are eventually useful for high performance computing. However the most adapted solution currently is IaaS form of cloud computing. It actually provides ultimate relaxation to its users regarding management or maintenance of applications that run on fast (Pay as you Use) machines. Moreover, the additional computational capacity is always available on extra payment. This solution seems best for intermittent HPC users due the several reasons that are,

  • There is no need to buy or establish a whole cloud infrastructure with a fear of rapidly deteriorating worth of hardware.
  • The need to curtail the software updates or to worry about overheating and power fluctuation problems becomes irrelevant.

Technically an IaaS cloud-computing environment stands on a layer of abstraction that hides different levels of complexities. This layer comprises of multiple virtual replicas of each physical machine in the network (i.e. cloud). Each replica appears to be a fully capable and independent machine with its dedicated processing power, peripheral devices and memory address space. These machines appear to be capable of running any software including operating system along with managing connections with other machines on the network. The most popular virtual machine environments are VMWare, Xen and Virtual Box etc. These environments offer a user-friendly interface to perform and manage functions related to the cloud. These functions may include creation and deletion of virtual machines, allocation and balancing of load, modification of resources including connections, accounting, security etc.