SCIDDLE: A tool for large scale distributed computing

We report on a portable communication environment, ‘SCIDDLE’, for distributing computations over heterogenous networks of UNIX computers. SCIDDLE is based on the client-server model. It was designed to support the distribution of large scale numerical computations and to keep its usage as simple as possible. All interprocess communication is done via remote procedure calls. The user defines the interface between communicating processes in a simple declarative language. Parallel programming is supported by asynchronous RPCs. A convenient array handing has been implemented. We demonstrate the usefulness of the system with an application from quantum chemistry on internet-connected workstations and supercomputers.

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