Distributed Systems

Chapter 1: Introduction to Distributed

Systems

November 5, 2018
Presentation Outline

 Introduction and Definition of Distributed Systems

 Characteristics of Distributed Systems
 Organization and Goals of DSs
 The Client-Server Model
 Types of Distributed Systems
 Advantages and Challenges of DSs
 Hardware and Software Concepts

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1.1. Introduction
From a Single Computer to DS
 Before the mid-80s, computers were
 very expensive (hundred of thousands or even millions
of dollars)
 very slow (a few thousand instructions per second)
 not connected among themselves
 After the mid-80s: two major developments
 cheap and powerful microprocessor-based computers
appeared
 computer networks
 LANs at speeds ranging from 10 to 1000 Mbps
 WANs at speed ranging from 64 Kbps to gigabits/sec
 Consequence
 feasibility of using a large network of computers to work for the
same application; this is in contrast to the old centralized systems
where there was a single computer with its peripherals
 Distributed Systems 3
…Introduction
 Networks of computers are everywhere!
 Mobile phone networks
 Corporate networks

Factory networks

Campus networks

Home networks

In-car networks

On board networks in planes and trains

 This subject aims:

 to cover characteristics of networked

computers that impact system designers

and implementers, and
 to present the main concepts and

techniques that have been developed to

help in the tasks of designing and
implementing systems and applications that
are based on them (networks).
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What Is a Distributed System?

Definition:

Operational perspective:
 “A system in which hardware or software components
located at networked computers communicate and
coordinate their actions only by message passing.”
[Coulouris].

User perspective:
 A distributed system is:
a collection of independent computers that appears to its
users as a single coherent system - computer (Tanenbaum
& Van Steen)

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 This definition has two aspects:
1. Hardware: autonomous machines
2. Software: a single system view for the users
(Middleware)
 Examples:

Cluster:

“A type of parallel or distributed processing system, which consists of a
collection of interconnected stand-alone computers cooperatively working
together as a single, integrated computing resource” [Buyya].

Cloud:

“a type of parallel and distributed system consisting of a collection of
interconnected and virtualised computers that are dynamically
provisioned and presented as one or more unified computing resources
based on service-level agreements established through negotiation
between the service provider and consumers” [Buyya].

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 Why Distributed?
 Resource and Data Sharing
 printers, databases, multimedia servers, ...
 Availability, Reliability
 the loss of some instances can be hidden
 Scalability, Extensibility
 the system grows with demand (e.g., extra servers)
 Performance
 huge power (CPU, memory, ...) available
 Inherent distribution, communication
 organizational distribution, e-mail, video

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 1.2. Characteristics of Distributed Systems

 Differences between the computers and the ways they

communicate are hidden from users
 Users and applications can interact with a distributed system
in a consistent and uniform way regardless of location
 Distributed systems should be easy to expand and scale
 a distributed system is normally continuously available, even
if there may be partial failures
- Users and applications should not notice that parts are
being replaced or fixed, or that new parts are added to serve
more users or applications

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1.3. Organization and Goals of a Distributed Systems
 to support heterogeneous computers and networks and to
provide a single-system view, a distributed system is
often organized by means of a layer of software called
middleware that extends over multiple machines

Same interface everywhere

a distributed system organized as middleware; note that the middleware

layer extends over multiple machines 9
Goals of a distributed system:
a distributed system should
 make resources accessible(printers, computers, storage
facilities, data, files, Web pages, ...)
 reasons: economics, to collaborate and exchange
information
 be transparent: hide the fact that the resources and
processes are distributed across multiple computers.
 be open
 be scalable

Transparency in a Distributed System

 a distributed system that is able to present itself to users
and applications as if it were only a single computer
system is said to be transparent
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 different forms of transparency in a distributed system
Transparency Description
Access Hide differences in data representation
and how a resource is accessed
Location Hide where a resource is physically located; where
is http://www.prenhall.com/index.html? (naming)
Migration Hide that a resource may move to another location
Relocation Hide that a resource may be moved to another
location while in use; e.g., mobile users using their wireless
laptops
Replication Hide that a resource is replicated
Concurrency Hide that a resource may be shared by several
competitive users; a resource must be left in a
consistent state
Failure Hide the failure and recovery of a resource
Persistence Hide whether a (software) resource is in memory or on
disk
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 Openness in a Distributed System
 an Open Distributed System is a system that offers services
according to standard rules that describe the syntax and
semantics of those services; e.g., protocols in networks
 a distributed system should be open
 we need well-defined interfaces
 interoperability
 components of different origin can communicate
 portability
 components work on different platforms
 another goal of an open distributed system is that it should
be flexible and extensible; easy to configure the system out
of different components; easy to add new components,
replace existing ones

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  in distributed systems, such services are often specified
through interfaces often described using an Interface
Definition Language (IDL)
 specify only syntax: the names of the functions, types
of parameters, return values, possible exceptions, ...

Scalability in Distributed Systems

 Scalability in three dimensions
 a distributed system should be scalable:
 in size: adding more users and resources to the system
 Geographically : users and resources may be far apart
 Administratively: should be easy to manage even if it
spans many administrative organizations

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 Scalability Problems
 Problems with size scalability: performance problems caused by
limited capacity of servers and networks
 Often caused by centralized solutions

Concept Example
Single server for all users-mostly for security
Centralized services
reasons
Centralized data A single on-line telephone book
Doing routing based on complete
Centralized algorithms
information
examples of scalability limitations
 Problems with geographical scalability:
 traditional synchronous communication in LAN

 unreliable communications in WAN

 Problems with administrative scalability:

 Conflicting policies, complex management, security problems
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 Scaling Techniques

 how to solve scaling problems

 the problem is mainly performance, and arises as a result
of limitations in the capacity of servers and networks (for
geographical scalability)
 three possible solutions: hiding communication latencies,
distribution, and replication

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a. Hiding Communication Latencies
 try to avoid waiting for responses to remote service
requests
 let the requester do other useful job
 i.e., construct requesting applications that use only
asynchronous communication instead of synchronous
communication; when a reply arrives the application is
interrupted
 good for batch processing and parallel applications but
not for interactive applications
 for interactive applications, move part of the job to the
client to reduce communication; e.g. filling a form and
checking the entries

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b. Replication
 replicate components across a distributed system to
increase availability and for load balancing, leading to
better performance
 decided by the owner of a resource
 caching (a special form of replication) also reduces
communication latency; decided by the user
 but, caching and replication may lead to consistency
problems (see Chapter 6 - Consistency and Replication)

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1.4. The Client-Server Model
 how are processes organized in a system
 thinking in terms of clients requesting services from
servers

general interaction between a client and a server

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1.4.1. Application Layering
 no clear distinction between a client and a server; for
instance a server for a distributed database may act as a
client when it forwards requests to different file servers
 three levels exist
 the user-interface level: implemented by clients and
contains all that is required by a client; usually
through GUIs, but not necessarily
 the processing level: contains the applications
 the data level: contains the programs that maintain
the actual data dealt with

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1.5 TYPES OF DISTRIBUTED SYSTEMS
1. Distributed computing systems
 Used for high performance computing tasks

 Cluster and Cloud computing systems

 Grid computing systems
2. Distributed information systems
 Systems mainly for management and integration of business functions
 Transaction processing systems
 Enterprise application integration

– Goal: Distribute information across several servers

3. Distributed pervasive( Ubiquitous ) systems
– Focus on mobile, embedded, communicating systems
– Goal: Spread a real-life environment with a large variety of smart devices.
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 1. Distributed Computing Systems
a) Cluster Computing Systems
Essentially a group of systems connected through a LAN.
 Homogeneous
o Same OS, near-identical hardware
 A collection of computing nodes + master node
 Master runs middleware: parallel execution and management
 Centralized job management & scheduling system

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 b) Grid Computing Systems
Lots of nodes (including clusters across multiple subnets) from
everywhere.
 Federation of autonomous and heterogeneous computer
systems (HW,OS,...), several admin domains
 Heterogeneous
 Dispersed across several organizations
 To allow for collaborations, grids generally use virtual
organizations.
 Distributed job management & scheduling

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Fig: A layered architecture for grid computing systems
c) Cloud Computing Systems
Over 20 definitions:
 http://cloudcomputing.sys-con.com/read/612375_p.htm
 Renting “remote storage”  backup
 Renting “remote server”  hosting Web server
 Renting “remote more servers”  to manage large workload
 Scientific definition of Cloud Computing 
 “Cloud is a market-oriented distributed computing system
consisting of a collection of inter-connected and virtualized
computers that are dynamically provisioned and presented as
one or more unified computing resources based on service-
level agreements (SLAs) established through negotiation
between the service provider and consumers.”
 SLA = {negotiated and agreed QoS parameters + rewards
+ penalties for violation of agreement....}
( taken from- www.cloudbus.org + www.buyya.com)
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Cloud Services

 Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

 CPU, Storage: Amazon.com, Google Software as a Service (SaaS)

Compute, ….
 Platform as a Service (PaaS)
 Google App Engine, Microsoft Platform as a Service (PaaS)

Azure,..
 Software as a Service (SaaS)
 Gmail.com,Facebook.com,Youtube.com,S
alesForce.Com,… Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

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…..Cloud Services

Fig: Cloud Service architecture

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 Cloud Deployment Models

Public/Internet Private/Enterprise Hybrid/Inter

Clouds Clouds Clouds

3rd party, Mixed usage of

Cloud model run
multi-tenant Cloud private and public
within a company’s
infrastructure Clouds: Leasing public
own Data Center /
& services: cloud services
infrastructure for
when private cloud
internal and/or
* available on capacity is
partners use.
subscription basis insufficient

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 Cloud Applications
• Scientific/Tech Applications
• Business Applications
• Consumer/Social Applications

Science and Technical Applications

Business Applications

Consumer/Social Applications 27
Transaction Processing Systems
A transaction is a collection of operations on the state of an object
(database, object composition, etc.) that satisfies the following properties
(ACID):
 Atomicity: All operations either succeed, or all of them fail.
- When the transaction fails, the state of the object will remain
unaffected by the transaction.
 Consistency: A transaction establishes a valid state transition.
- This does not exclude the possibility of invalid,
intermediate states during the transaction’s execution.
 Isolation: Concurrent transactions do not interfere with each other.
- It appears to each transaction T that other transactions occur either
before T, or after T, but never both.
 Durability: After the execution of a transaction, its effects are
made permanent:
- Changes to the state survive failures.
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 Transaction Processing Monitor
 In many cases, the data involved in a transaction is distributed across several
servers. A TP Monitor is responsible for coordinating the execution of a
transaction

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 Mobile Computing Systems

 Mobile computing systems are generally a subclass of ubiquitous

computing systems and meet all of the five requirements.
Typical characteristics
 Many different types of mobile devices: smart phones, remote controls,
car equipment, and so on
 Wireless communication
 Devices may continuously change their location =>
o setting up a route may be problematic, as routes can change
frequently
o devices may easily be temporarily disconnected=>
disruption-tolerant networks

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 Sensor Networks

 Consists of spatially distributed autonomous sensors to

cooperatively monitor physical or environmental conditions, such
as temperature, sound, vibration, pressure, motion or pollutants,
etc.
Characteristics
 The nodes to which sensors are attached are:
• Many (10s-1000s)
• Simple (small memory/compute/communication capacity)
• Often battery-powered (or even battery-less)

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EXAMPLE

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Distributed Pervasive Systems: Examples

 Electronic Health Systems

 Devices are physically close to a person

 Where and how should monitored data be stored?

 How can we prevent loss of crucial data?

 What infrastructure is needed to generate and
propagate alerts?
 How can security be enforced?

 How can physicians provide online feedback?

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EXAMPLE

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 Pros and Cons of Distributed Systems

Pros of Distributed Systems

 Performance: Very often a collection of processors can provide higher
performance (and better price/performance ratio) than a centralized
computer.
 Distribution: many applications involve, by their nature, spatially
separated machines (banking, commercial, automotive system).
 Reliability (fault tolerance): if some of the machines crash, the system
can survive.
 Incremental growth: as requirements on processing power grow, new
machines can be added incrementally.
 Sharing of data/resources: shared data is essential to many
applications (banking, computer supported cooperative work,
reservation systems); other resources can be also shared (e.g. expensive
printers).
 Communication: facilitates human-to-human communication.
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 Cons of Distributed Systems

 Difficulties of developing distributed software: how should

operating systems, programming languages and

applications look like?
 Networking problems: several problems are created by

the network infrastructure, which have to be dealt

with: loss of messages, overloading, ...
 Security problems: sharing generates the problem of data

security.

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1.6 Hardware and Software Concepts
o Hardware Concepts
 different classification schemes exist
 Multiprocessors - with shared memory
 Multicomputers - that do not share memory
 can be homogeneous or heterogeneous

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 Heterogeneous Multicomputer Systems
 most distributed systems are built on heterogeneous
multicomputer systems
 the computers could be different in processor type,
memory size, architecture, power, operating system, etc.
and the interconnection network may be highly
heterogeneous as well
 the distributed system provides a software layer to hide the
heterogeneity at the hardware level; i.e., provides
transparency

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o Software Concepts
 OSs in relation to distributed systems
 tightly-coupled systems, referred to as distributed OSs
(DOS)
 the OS tries to maintain a single, global view of the
resources it manages
 used for multiprocessors and homogeneous
multicomputers
 loosely-coupled systems, referred to as network OSs
(NOS)
 a collection of computers each running its own OS; they
work together to make their services and resources
available to others
 used for heterogeneous multicomputers
 Middleware: to enhance the services of NOSs so that a
better support for distribution transparency is provided

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 Distributed Operating Systems
 two types
 multiprocessor operating system: to manage the
resources of a multiprocessor
 multicomputer operating system: for homogeneous
multicomputers
 Uniprocessor Operating Systems
 separating applications from operating system code
through a microkernel

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 Network Operating Systems
 possibly heterogeneous underlying hardware
 constructed from a collection of uniprocessor systems, each
with its own operating system and connected to each other
in a computer network

general structure of a network operating system

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 Services offered by network operating systems
 remote login (rlogin)
 remote file copy (rcp)
 shared file systems through file servers

two clients and a server in a network operating system

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