DYNAMIC DEFINITION FOR CONCURRENT COMPUTING ENVIRONMENTS

• US 20100333092A1
• Filed: 09/02/2010
• Published: 12/30/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 11/10/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: The MathWorks, Inc.
• Original Assignee: The MathWorks, Inc.
• Inventors: CHAN, Elwin Yam Ming, O'CALLAGHAN, Portia, STEFANSSON, Halldor Narfi, DEAN, Loren
• Granted Patent: US 8,819,119 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 718/100
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/44505 Configuring for program initiating, e.g. using registry, configuration files
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/00 Arrangements for maintenance, administration or management of data switching networks, e.g. of packet switching networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0813 characterised by the conditions triggering a change of settings
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/30 Managing network names, e.g. use of aliases or nicknames name-to-address mapping H04L61/45
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/01 Protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416

Abstract

Exemplary embodiments allow a user to create configurations for use in distributed computing environments. Configurations can be arranged in hierarchies in which elements of the hierarchy can inherit characteristics from elements in other layers of the hierarchy. Embodiments also allow a user to flatten a hierarchical configuration to remove hierarchical dependencies and/or inheriting capabilities of elements in the hierarchy. Exemplary embodiments further allow users to deploy a distributed computing configuration on their desktop to evaluate performance of the configuration and then deploy the configuration in a distributed computing environment without having to change programming code run on the desktop/distributed computing environment.

Claims

1. A computer-readable medium holding executable instructions for configuring a distributed computing environment, the medium holding one or more instructions for:

receiving a configuration, the configuration specifying;

a cluster configuration for the distributed computing environment, where;

the cluster configuration is accessible using an identifier,

the cluster configuration operates in a hierarchical arrangement of cluster configurations, and

the hierarchical arrangement of cluster configurations allows the configuration to inherit a characteristic from a hierarchical level that is an ancestor with respect to the level of the hierarchy at which the cluster configuration resides when the cluster configuration inherits the characteristic; and

storing the cluster configuration, where the stored cluster configuration is accessible using the identifier.

2. The medium of claim 1, further holding one or more instructions for:

modifying information associated with the cluster configuration, where;

the modifying produces a modified configuration.

3. The medium of claim 2, where the modifying includes:

editing information in the cluster configuration,

adding new information to the cluster configuration, or

removing information from the cluster configuration;

4. The medium of claim 1, where the cluster configuration includes:

a job configuration for specifying one or more jobs processed in the distributed computing environment.

5. The medium of claim 4, where the job configuration operates in a hierarchy of job configurations.

6. The medium of claim 4, where the job configuration includes:

a task configuration for specifying one or more tasks processed in the distributed computing environment.

7. The medium of claim 6, where the task configuration operates in a hierarchy of task configurations.

8. The medium of claim 1, further holding one or more instructions for:

modifying information associated with the cluster configuration, where the modifying includes;

modifying information associated with the job configuration,

modifying information associated with the task configuration, or

switching to another job configuration or another task configuration.

9. The medium of claim 1, further holding one or more instructions for:

displaying the configuration via a user interface;

10. The medium of claim 1, where the identifier is one of an alias, a path name, a universal resource locator (URL), a registry entry, an active directory, or a file name.

11. The medium of claim 1, wherein the receiving a configuration is in response to an accessing operation including a search path.

12. The medium of claim 1, where the stored cluster configuration is periodically updated.

13. The medium of claim 12, where the periodically updating includes inheriting characteristics from one or more ancestors.

14. The medium of claim 1, further holding one or more instructions for:

flattening the cluster configuration.

15. The medium of claim 14, further holding one or more instructions for:

exporting the flattened configuration.

16. The medium of claim 1, further holding one or more instructions for:

flattening the cluster configuration prior to the storing the cluster configuration.

17. The medium of claim 1, where the cluster configuration obtains settings from an application that is a MATLAB-compatible application.

18. A computer-readable medium holding executable instructions that when executed on a processor configure a distributed computing environment, the medium holding one or more instructions for:

loading a configuration, where;

the configuration is configured to inherit characteristics from an ancestor,

the configuration identifies a desktop computing environment, where;

the desktop environment operates as a cluster emulator, and

the cluster emulator tests characteristics of a cluster configuration by emulating the cluster configuration without using remote processing resources with respect to the desktop,

the cluster emulator emulates a cluster having two or more workers, where;

the workers perform distributed computing operations on a task when the task is made available to the workers based on the cluster configuration, and

the task includes programming code;

configuring the desktop computing environment using the configuration, where;

the configured desktop computing environment emulates the cluster and workers using processing resources associated with the desktop computing environment, and

the desktop computing environment performs processing on the task according to the configuration;

generating a processing result when the configured desktop computing environment processes the task according to the configuration; and

determining whether the processing result is acceptable.

19. The medium of claim 18, further including:

deploying the cluster configuration when the processing result is acceptable, where;

the deployed cluster configuration uses the two or more workers to perform the distributed computing operations on the task, and

the two or more workers generate a distributed computing result when distributed computing operations are completed with respect to the task.

20. The medium of claim 18, where:

the parameter has a first value when the configuration is used to emulate the cluster configuration in the desktop computing environment, and

the parameter has a second value when the configuration is used as the cluster configuration for interacting with the two or more workers.

21. The medium of claim 20, further holding one or more instructions for:

changing the parameter from the first value to the second value; and

performing the deploying when the parameter is set at the second value.

22. The medium of claim 18, where the configuration includes a hierarchical structure.

23. The medium of claim 22, where the hierarchical structure includes an element that inherits properties from the ancestor.

24. The medium of claim 18, where the medium further holds one or more instructions for:

flattening the configuration.

25. The medium of claim 24, wherein a user interacts with the configuration via a user interface.

26. A computer-readable medium holding executable instructions that when executed on a processor interact with a data structure, medium holding one or more instructions for:

accessing a data structure, the data structure comprising a configuration, where the configuration specifies a cluster configuration that;

operates in a hierarchy of cluster configurations,

inherits one or more characteristics from a hierarchical level that is an ancestor with respect to the level of the hierarchy at which the cluster configuration resides when the cluster configuration inherits the one or more characteristics, and

is accessible using an identifier, and where the cluster configuration comprises;

information for requesting a first worker, the first worker performing distributed processing activities on behalf of a client, and

information for requesting a second worker, the second worker simultaneously performing distributed computing activities in conjunction with the first worker on behalf of the client; and

using accessed information in the cluster configuration to configure the first worker and the second worker for performing distributed computing activities on behalf of the client.

27. The medium of claim 26, where the data structure further comprises at least one of:

a job configuration, comprising;

information identifying one or more jobs, the one or more jobs processed by the first worker and the second worker when the first and second worker perform distributed computing activities on behalf of the client, and

a task configuration, comprising;

information identifying one or more tasks, where;

the one or more tasks are included in the job when the one or more tasks are in the data structure,

the one or more tasks include program code executed on the first worker and the second worker, and

the first worker and the second worker produce a result when the one or more tasks are executed on behalf of the client.

28. The medium of claim 27, further holding one or more instructions for:

modifying information in the cluster configuration, the job configuration or the task configuration when the task configuration resides in the data structure, where;

the modifying is performed on behalf of the client, and

the modifying produces a modified data structure.

29. The medium of claim 26, where the cluster configuration includes a task configuration that identifies program code executed on the first worker and the second worker, where the program code is MATLAB-compatible code.

30. The medium of claim 26, where the data structure includes a hierarchy of cluster configurations.

31. The medium of claim 26, where the data structure includes a flattened cluster configuration.

32. The medium of claim 26, where the medium further holds one or more instructions for:

exporting the modified data structure.

33. The medium of claim 26, where the medium further holds one or more instructions for:

sending the data structure to a destination.

34. The medium of claim 33, where the destination includes a scheduler or a process launcher.

35. A computer-readable medium holding executable instructions that when executed on a processor configure a distributed computing environment, the medium holding one or more instructions for:

loading a configuration, where;

the configuration;

inherits characteristics from an ancestor,

identifies a desktop environment that emulates the cluster when the configuration includes a parameter set to a first value, and

identifies a cluster when the parameter is set to a second value, where;

the cluster includes two or more workers,

the workers perform distributed computing operations on a task, and

the task includes programming code; and

configuring;

the desktop computing environment using the configuration when the parameter is set to the first value, and

the two or more workers in the cluster when the parameter is set to the second value.