Extending WebCom: a proposed framework for Web based distributed computing

The introduction of Java in the mid nineties has revolutionised and revitalised interest in the construction of "supercomputers" from "off the shelf" components. Much of the research spawned by the introduction of Java is in the area of metacomputing, where projects that utilise the distributed capabilities of the World Wide Web are becoming more frequent. WebCom is one such system that implements a framework to harness these distributed resources. Although WebCom supports different models of computation, by incorporating them as distinct modular components, an implicitly parallel graph-based model is used. Visual programming tools for simulation steering are employed allowing the creation, submission and dynamic manipulation of programs.