Ad hoc Grid: An Adaptive and Self-Organizing Peer-to-Peer Computing Grid

This paper presents an adaptive and self-organizing Peer-to-Peer (P2P) computing grid. The proposed solution, named ad hoc Grid, leverages on the OurGrid (OG) middleware, which is an open source P2P computing grid. OG requires some centralized administration, preventing it to be used for deploying spontaneous (ad hoc) computing grids. To make the P2P grid adaptive and self-organizing, new approaches were adopted for Peer discovery, failure handling and failure recovery. Grid nodes communicate via multicast: a set of grid members (e.g., nodes in the same local network) are logically connected to a single Peer, and they coordinate through a local multicast group; as for the Peers, they get to know each other through another multicast group, by exchanging periodical and on demand messages which allow them to coordinate and keep the grid connected. Instead of having a static and well defined role in the grid as in the OG architecture, any grid node might eventually take the Peer role. This way, the grid can be instantiated even with a single node, and grow as new nodes join the grid. ad hoc Grid is well suited for those willing to quickly deploy a computing grid without requiring any centralized administration, by just combining the computing power of distributed machinery of users willing to join the grid.