Beowulf & VMWare

[Donald Becker]

On 30 Oct 2002, Chris Black wrote:
> On Wed, 2002-10-30 at 12:17, Marquardt, Paul wrote:
> > One of the scenarios presented by the group was to build a Beowulf cluster
> > and use VMWare GSX Server to partition it. 
..
> You might consider also looking into User Mode Linux (UML).
> http://user-mode-linux.sourceforge.net/
> I don't have experience with it but have done some reading and it sounds
> like it might be well-suited to what you want to do.

We've looked at using UML.  While the description is similar, UML is not
the same kind of system as VMWare.
   - UML requires specially modified kernels
   - UML ties you to a single kernel and configuration
   - UML kernels are only usable in UML mode

VMWare creates emulated physical machines, which can run any kernel and
environment.

Running VMWare on compute nodes allows the cluster to run and manage
both native and alien (e.g. Microsoft) applications.

-- 
Donald Becker				becker at scyld.com
Scyld Computing Corporation		http://www.scyld.com
410 Severn Ave. Suite 210		Scyld Beowulf cluster system
Annapolis MD 21403			410-990-9993