geordie@ritcsh.UUCP (Geordie 'Gweeb' Klueber) (03/01/88)
In article <2902@pitt.UUCP> jonathan@vax.cs.pittsburgh.edu.UUCP (Jonathan Eunice) writes: >In article <985@luth.luth.se> roland@sm.luth.se (Roland Hedberg) writes: >>is it possible to run Unix on a Vax cluster? > >NO. A VaxCluster is a confederation of Vax machines sharing common >resources. It is implemented as an extension to VMS, plus some >connecting hardware. It is not portable to other operating systems. The Ultrix team at DEC is working on this and I'm told that we may see Ultrix Clustering (through the use of NFS as a start) by this summer. -- -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Geordie Klueber Computer Science House UUCP: ...rochester!ritcv!ritcsh!geordie BITNET: gfk8070@ritvax "Meanwhile, lurking by a stone in the mud..."
ccoprrd@pyr.gatech.EDU (Richard B Dervan) (03/08/88)
In article <1209@ritcsh.UUCP>, geordie@ritcsh.UUCP (Geordie 'Gweeb' Klueber) writes: >In article <2902@pitt.UUCP> jonathan@vax.cs.pittsburgh.edu.UUCP (Jonathan Eunice) writes: >>In article <985@luth.luth.se> roland@sm.luth.se (Roland Hedberg) writes: >>>is it possible to run Unix on a Vax cluster? >>NO. A VaxCluster is a confederation of Vax machines sharing common >>resources.... >The Ultrix team at DEC is working on this..... We have a 'cluster' of 24 VaxStation 2000's running Ultrix in one of our computer labs. As far as Johnathan's definition of a cluster, I think we meet the requirements. We have the 24 workstations hooked to two file servers (Micro-Vaxen) via NFS and a PrintServer 40. Each station has access to the same resources/files as any other. -Richard -- _________________________________________________________________________ | Richard B Dervan BitNet: ccoprrd@gitvm1 | | Office of Computing Services ARPA : ccoprrd@pyr.gatech.edu | | Georgia Institute of Technology CIS : 70365,1012 | | Atlanta, Ga 30332 MCI : RDERVAN | | uucp: ...!{akgua,allegra,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo}!gatech!gitpyr!ccoprrd | |__________________"We don't fit the mold...we build it"__________________|
ron@topaz.rutgers.edu (Ron Natalie) (03/12/88)
Up until recently, a VAXCluster is a set of VAX's around interconnected by the CI bus. The CI disk/tape controller (HSC50) which is the heart of the VAXCluster is very hostile to non-VMS/TOPS-20 operating systems, as it has OS specific code in the controller microcode. I assume DEC is planning to provide Ultrix support in the HSC. Lately DEC is selling things called (humorously) local area VAXClusters. This is essentially a DEC proprietary equivelent to the traditional diskless workstation. It requires no specific hardware other than an DECNET compatible network interface. Note that due to unexplained phenomena, you can't support diskless Local Area VAXCluster nodes from a real CI VAXCluster. -Ron
rad@mitre-bedford.arpa (Dick Dramstad) (03/15/88)
Ron, You write: >Up until recently, a VAXCluster is a set of VAX's around interconnected by >the CI bus. The CI disk/tape controller (HSC50) which is the heart of the >VAXCluster is very hostile to non-VMS/TOPS-20 operating systems, as it has >OS specific code in the controller microcode. I assume DEC is planning to >provide Ultrix support in the HSC. >Lately DEC is selling things called (humorously) local area VAXClusters. >This is essentially a DEC proprietary equivelent to the traditional >diskless workstation. It requires no specific hardware other than an >DECNET compatible network interface. Note that due to unexplained phenomena, >you can't support diskless Local Area VAXCluster nodes from a real CI >VAXCluster. Understanding why you can't support LAVC nodes from a real CI VAXcluster will not only take the mystery out of this "unexplained phenomena", it might even take the "humor" out of the situation. And "traditional diskless workstation"? My, how quickly nice innovations become traditional! Wonder when I'm going to get a traditional personal supercomputer on my desk? :-) VMS's CI driver is just another path to disk and tape drives, like MASSBUS or Unibus device drivers. The DEC workstation folks looked at VMS and said, "Hey, we'll just diddle the CI driver and make it talk over the Ethernet instead of those expensive funny blue CI cables and then we can have a traditional diskless workstation." (I'm paraphrasing, of course...) Ethernet is slower than the CI, but for MicroVAXs it does a reasonable job. Now, if you substitute the Ethernet CI driver on the boot node (the moral equivalent of a file server), you can't get to CI-connected devices because VMS "knows" that you only have one CI. So, you can have one or the other, but not both. DEC will tell you (although probably not officially) that they're working on "hierarchical" VAX clusters that do what you'd like them to, but given the amount of work it took to make regular VAX clusters work (Version 4.n, basically), I wouldn't be surprised by a long wait. (Then again, I'm sure the changes to the Unix kernel to support NFS were no less pervasive than VMS changes to support VAXclusters. I've heard it said that yes, you could "drop NFS" into a regular BSD kernel, but it "makes a big splash." Hierarchical clusters will probably cause a flood.) Dick Dramstad rad@mitre-bedford.arpa
ron@topaz.rutgers.edu (Ron Natalie) (03/16/88)
The problem for us is that DEC sold us LAVC for our real VAXCluster, the local engineering people weren't smart enough to figure out why it didn't work. -Ron