United Devices
Encyclopedia
Distributed computing
Distributed computing is a field of computer science that studies distributed systems. A distributed system consists of multiple autonomous computers that communicate through a computer network. The computers interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal...
company that focused on the use of grid computing
Grid computing
Grid computing is a term referring to the combination of computer resources from multiple administrative domains to reach a common goal. The grid can be thought of as a distributed system with non-interactive workloads that involve a large number of files...
to manage HPC
High-performance computing
High-performance computing uses supercomputers and computer clusters to solve advanced computation problems. Today, computer systems approaching the teraflops-region are counted as HPC-computers.-Overview:...
infrastructures and enterprise cluster management. Its products and services allowed users to "allocate workloads to computers and devices throughout enterprises, aggregating computing power that would normally go unused." It operated under the name Univa UD for a time, after merging with Univa on September 17, 2007.
History
Founded in 1999 in Austin, TexasAustin, Texas
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of :Texas and the seat of Travis County. Located in Central Texas on the eastern edge of the American Southwest, it is the fourth-largest city in Texas and the 14th most populous city in the United States. It was the third-fastest-growing large city in...
, United Devices began with distributed computing expertise from distributed.net
Distributed.net
distributed.net is a worldwide distributed computing effort that is attempting to solve large scale problems using otherwise idle CPU or GPU time. It is officially recognized as a non-profit organization under U.S...
and SETI@home
SETI@home
SETI@home is an Internet-based public volunteer computing project employing the BOINC software platform, hosted by the Space Sciences Laboratory, at the University of California, Berkeley, in the United States. SETI is an acronym for the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence...
, although only a few of the original technical staff from those organizations are still on board today.
In April 2001, grid.org was formally launched as a philanthropic non-profit website to demonstrate the benefits of Internet-based large scale grid computing.
Later in 2002 with help from UD, NTT Data
Nippon Telegraph and Telephone
, commonly known as NTT, is a Japanese telecommunications company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. Ranked the 31st in Fortune Global 500, NTT is the largest telecommunications company in Asia, and the second-largest in the world in terms of revenue....
launched a similar Internet-based Cell Computing
Cell Computing
Cell Computing is a now-defunct distributed computing project that was operated by NTT Data to perform biomedical research.It used the Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing platform, however it was initially launched using the United Devices Grid MP platform in 2002.The project ended...
project targeting Japanese users. In 2004, IBM
IBM
International Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...
and United Devices worked together to start the World Community Grid
World Community Grid
World Community Grid is an effort to create the world's largest public computing grid to tackle scientific research projects that benefit humanity...
project as another demonstration of Internet-based grid computing.
In August 2005, United Devices acquired the Paris-based GridXpert company and added Synergy to its product lineup.
In 2006, the company acknowledged seeing an industry shift from only using grid computing for compute-intensive applications towards data center
Data center
A data center is a facility used to house computer systems and associated components, such as telecommunications and storage systems...
automation and business application optimization.
Partly in response to the market shifts and reorganization, grid.org
Grid.org
grid.org was a website and online community established in 2001 that focuses on cluster computing and grid computing software for users. For the first 6 years of its history it operated several different volunteer computing projects that allowed members to donate their spare computer cycles to...
was shut down on April 27, 2007 after completing its mission to "demonstrate the viability and benefits of large-scale Internet-based grid computing".
On September 17, 2007, the company announced that it would merge with the Lisle, Illinois
Lisle, Illinois
Lisle is a village in DuPage County, Illinois, United States. The population was 22,930 at the 2011 census, and estimated to be 23,135 as of 2008. It is part of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Illinois Technology and Research Corridor...
-based Univa and operate under the new name Univa UD. The combined company would offer open source solutions based around Globus Toolkit
Globus Toolkit
The Globus Toolkit, currently at version 5, is an open source toolkit for building computing grids developed and provided by the Globus Alliance.-Standards implementation:The Globus Toolkit is an implementation of the following standards:...
, while continuing to sell its existing grid products and support its existing customers.
On June 26, 2008, United Devices client software on World Community Grid
World Community Grid
World Community Grid is an effort to create the world's largest public computing grid to tackle scientific research projects that benefit humanity...
finished its role and completely relayed to BOINC's.
Commercial products
- Grid MP — a job scheduler and application provisioning platform. It is offered in various editions, depending on the scalability needs of the customer. The company publishes a list of high-profile organizations using Grid MP on the United Devices website.
- MP Insight — allows customers to perform data analysisData analysisAnalysis of data is a process of inspecting, cleaning, transforming, and modeling data with the goal of highlighting useful information, suggesting conclusions, and supporting decision making...
to determine if their grid computing resources are being effectively used.
- MP Synergy — a metascheduler based on Globus ToolkitGlobus ToolkitThe Globus Toolkit, currently at version 5, is an open source toolkit for building computing grids developed and provided by the Globus Alliance.-Standards implementation:The Globus Toolkit is an implementation of the following standards:...
technology that allows users to perform efficient scheduling within an organization that has multiple job schedulerJob schedulerA job scheduler is a software application that is in charge of unattended background executions, commonly known for historical reasons as batch processing....
s already deployed and controlling independent clusters. Supported schedulers include Grid MPGrid MPGrid MP is a commercial distributed computing software package developed and sold by Univa , a privately held company based primarily in Austin, Texas...
, Sun Grid EngineSun Grid EngineOracle Grid Engine, previously known as Sun Grid Engine , previously known as CODINE or GRD , is an open source batch-queuing system, developed and supported by Sun Microsystems...
, Platform LSF, PBSPortable Batch SystemPortable Batch System is the name of computer software that performs job scheduling. Its primary task is to allocate computational tasks, i.e., batch jobs, among the available computing resources...
, LoadLevelerLoadLevelerLoadLeveler is a job scheduler written by IBM, to control scheduling of batch jobs. LoadLeveler matches the job requirements with the best available computer resource for execution...
, and Condor.
- Reliance — designed specifically for the datacenter to provide automated infrastructure management and to ensure application service levels are honored by monitoring events and performing provisioning actions based on these events.
Public philanthropy
From 2001 until 2007, United Devices operated a series of public projects on their grid.orgGrid.org
grid.org was a website and online community established in 2001 that focuses on cluster computing and grid computing software for users. For the first 6 years of its history it operated several different volunteer computing projects that allowed members to donate their spare computer cycles to...
website as part of a philanthropic effort. It also acted as a marketing
Marketing
Marketing is the process used to determine what products or services may be of interest to customers, and the strategy to use in sales, communications and business development. It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques, business communication, and business developments...
tool, helping to spread awareness of the Grid MP
Grid MP
Grid MP is a commercial distributed computing software package developed and sold by Univa , a privately held company based primarily in Austin, Texas...
product and demonstrating the platform's scalability
Scalability
In electronics scalability is the ability of a system, network, or process, to handle growing amount of work in a graceful manner or its ability to be enlarged to accommodate that growth...
. Some of the costs associated with operating the past projects on grid.org have been financially sponsored in part by companies including Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
, Intel, and IBM
IBM
International Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...
.
On April 27, 2007, United Devices closed down grid.org and the Cancer Research Project with the announcement that it "has completed its mission to demonstrate the viability and benefits of large-scale Internet-based grid computing."
See also
- Distributed computingDistributed computingDistributed computing is a field of computer science that studies distributed systems. A distributed system consists of multiple autonomous computers that communicate through a computer network. The computers interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal...
- Grid computingGrid computingGrid computing is a term referring to the combination of computer resources from multiple administrative domains to reach a common goal. The grid can be thought of as a distributed system with non-interactive workloads that involve a large number of files...
- CPU scavenging
- Job schedulerJob schedulerA job scheduler is a software application that is in charge of unattended background executions, commonly known for historical reasons as batch processing....
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