To accommodate the ever-increasing demand for Utility Computing (UC) resources, while taking into account both energy and economical issues, the current trend consists in building larger and larger data centers in a few strategic locations. Although such an approach enables UC providers to cope with the actual demand while continuing to operate UC resources through centralized software system, it is far from delivering sustainable and efficient UC infrastructures. We claim that a disruptive change in UC infrastructures is required: UC resources should be managed differently, considering locality as a primary concern. To this aim, we propose to leverage any facilities available through the Internet in order to deliver widely distributed UC platforms that can better match the geographical dispersal of users as well as the unending demand. Critical to the emergence of such locality-based UC (LUC) platforms is the availability of appropriate operating mechanisms. We advocate the implementation of a unified system driving the use of resources at an unprecedented scale by turning a complex and diverse infrastructure into a collection of abstracted computing facilities that is both easy to operate and reliable.

Start Date: January 2015

Duration: 4 years

Avalon Members: J. Darrous, G. Fedak, C. Perez

More information on Discovery website