Tampere University of Technology, Department of Mathematics
Abstract
The computing power of present desktops is mostly unused under general office usage. These many computers can be unified into one grid, such that unused cycles can be scavenged to solve one computing task. Two software systems to build such grids are compared in this work: BOINC and Techila. These systems are critically compared through the computation of two different scientific tasks, making observations of each simultaneously.
BOINC is designed for volunteer computing where anyone can donate his or her computer to the joint computation via an Internet connection. The system has been designed to facilitate millions of client computers, from which the results can not be blindly trusted. In addition, the system holds volunteers’ interest in the computational work by giving credits for the processing donated. Also available is a screen saver that is related to the computational workload.
Techila is designed for the internal use of organizations that use scientific computing. In this case only the trusted, organization owned computers are used. The system makes it easy for many users to simultaneously add computation projects. Moreover, the user gets the results and error messages for his or her computations directly to their own computer. This makes it possible to run applications that are still under development in a grid.
This work concludes that BOINC is preferable for use in public projects where there is enough computation for thousands of client computers for months or even years. Techila is better suited for environments where many users want to use the grid for minor computation projects at the same time. Moreover, maintenance can be handled centrally with a web interface. BOINC does not provide such a tool
