Microsoft Finally up for Distributed Computing? 307
ReeprFlame writes "eWeek has reported overhearing Microsoft's plans to finally get into the distributed computing market. Considering that the Windows platform has never had the ability to parallel compute in the past, it leaves great potential to the company's operating system development. From current *nix systems we have today, such a grid proves very useful, especially in the serving arena. However, we are unsure of Microsoft's target for the software. Would it be an addition to home users computers as well as the server versions of Windows? As of now it is unclear, but Microsoft probably will bring this situation to life in the near future since it does hold alot of power for them over other platforms."
Third party solutions got there first (Score:4, Insightful)
I guess Microsoft is imagining a Be-- stop! put down that bat!
Comment removed (Score:1, Insightful)
Windows clusters don't make sense (Score:2, Insightful)
Say what you like about Linux "not ready for the desktop", but Linux (and *nix in general) totally rules the clustering arena.
Who wrote the summary? (Score:5, Insightful)
Does this make any sense? The rest of the summary is equally nonsensical.
Already done (Score:5, Insightful)
I imagine if Microsoft 'enahances' Windows to do this even easier, it'll make it even easier for spammers to write the next-generation spamming-joe-jobbing apps.
Kudos, Microsoft!
Re:Windows clusters don't make sense (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Windows clusters don't make sense (Score:5, Insightful)
So that's not really a reason why a Windows Cluster won't make sense.
Licensing costs are also not the biggest concern from big corporations.
Re:could be good (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Not a good idea (Score:4, Insightful)
The rest of the OS has way to much backwards compatibility to be able to strip things out.
Linux can run on clusters because you can install only those chunks that you need. in Windows every processor would also have to run the entire GUI. Even if it is never used.
Why do you think Longhorn is getting a full command line shell setup?
Not the same thing ... (Score:5, Insightful)
In this case, Mac OS X is sitting on top of a UNIX kernel -- a modified FreeBSD. Which means all of those parts aren't GUI oriented, and you get all of the same benefits of a UNIX with all of the eye candy that Apple knows how to make work well.
Windows seems to have been built with a model that expects everything to want to be GUI based and it includes a lot of stuff geared towards that. As has been pointed out elsewhere, Windows seems to be taking networking and other stuff as add-ons without having been accounted for in the first place. Though that's probably changing somewhat over time.
In the case of OS/X, it will happily do both functions without saddling the non-GUI stuff with extra baggage.
Not So Funny: China and its Threat (Score:1, Insightful)
In particular distributed computing has particular use in doing wargame simulations. The Pentagon has been doing its simulations on distributed systems for, at least, a decade.
DCOM, COM+ anyone? (Score:4, Insightful)
'Grid computing!!!111'... it's a buzzword. The technology is already available for many years, however not a lot of software uses it, if you look at the many many applications available.
Considering that the Windows platform has never had the ability to parallel compute in the past, it leaves great potential to the company's operating system development.
I don't know how much 'ReeprFlame' knows about windows, but it can't be a lot.
Re:Not a good idea (Score:4, Insightful)
I have no idea what you are talking about when it comes to networking and security in NT, sure the WIN32 part is troublesome to keep secure, but NT in itself has no such problems.
Flamebait? Please mods, this is the reason slashdot is losing readership. It's difficult to have a decent discussion, when all opposing views to the group opinion (right or wrong) are essentially censored down to obscurity.
blablabla (Score:5, Insightful)
huh? COM+ is designed to be a cross-machine/process object layer with security build in PER OBJECT, even per interface. Role based, AD controlled.
Stand alone? Add-ons? ever looked closely at windows 2000 or even NT 4? No, not the shell, the core OS.
Distributed computing simply isn't part of the base design. Morphing Windows into something it isn't will once again be a task for their marketing department, not engineering.
You have definitely totally no clue whatsoever, and with you the moderators who modded you 'insightful'. 'Bullshit' would have been more like it.
since when are programs ran when they're not used? (Score:5, Insightful)
No. First of all you can set cmd.exe as the shell instead of explorer.exe, second of all, if you don't hook up a monitor or log in, the shell is swapped out pretty fast, and doesn't get any cpu cycles.
Re:Not a good idea (Score:5, Insightful)
First: The WindowsNT line (WinNT, Win2k, Win2k3 and WinXP) isn't descended from DOS.
Second: WindowsNT had a rich file and process permissions and auditing model baked in at a low level that exceeded (and may still exceed) what Linux has today. The problem is that the default OS config was and is relatively permissive.
Re:Not the same thing ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Mac OS X is sitting on top of a UNIX kernel -- a modified FreeBSD.
Wrong. OSX' kernel is XNU - a modified version of Mach. OSX (or better Darwin) includes a lot of FreeBSD code, but it's not just a modified FreeBSD.
There's also a difference between Windows as a whole and just the NT kernel. The NT kernel isn't that bad. Most problems with Windows result from problems in the higher levels of the system - eg. IE.
Problems with higher levels of the Windows OS are not necessarily a reason against clustering on NT based Windows systems.
Re:Windows clusters don't make sense (Score:2, Insightful)
Why would a Windows distributed node need to run a GUI? The Windows kernel can function quite happily without a GUI.
Windows can be trimmed down. Remember that this is a future project so MS can do what they want. They do have the Windows source after all. No reason why they can't get a pared down OS.
Diskless booting of Windows is possible today.
Economically we don't know what the licensing for a distributed version of Windows would be since MS hasn't decided that yet - this product does not yet exist after all!
I'm not arguing that distributed Windows clusters will be a great success. All I'm saying is that this GUI stuff is not relevant. If a GUI eats resources then the product would have a console only mode.
MS has got a decent kernel, lots of experienced, clever developers and stacks of cash - it ought to be able to make this work if it so desired.
Re:Windows clusters don't make sense (Score:4, Insightful)
They cost money, they provide no advantages over linux or bsd, and they would propably need much more human hours for their administration.
besides, as i understand the article, this is mostly a development thingie, and some sort of central application management service. And with a possible* release date somewhere in the end of the decade it just doesn't seem important. I don't understand why this story was even posted
*possible as in "maybe it will be released" not as in "maybe in the end of the decade"
May we stop bashing M$ and come up for some air? (Score:2, Insightful)
I arrived a bit late on the scene to advise you guys, but here goes: If you are going to have a derogatory thread about M$ and how lame they are, um, get your terminology right first!
Parallel =! Distributed
Distributed =! Parallel
These are two different things and demonstrates how this board has a tendancy to go off a bit half-cocked over what M$ does and their capabilities.
What is even sadder, those speaking seriously of problems with Windows 95 (BSoD) having anything remotely to do with enterprise level systems today. Being an old-timer BSD and Linux user, I can safely say I've seen a share of pings of death and other BS with every OS. Sometimes, it becomes time to just let all that childish BS go, ya know? Implement what businesses need and works.